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WILLIAM D. BOYCE. 



unitp:d states 
DEPENDENCIES 



Cuba, Dominican Repul:)lic, Haiti, 
Panama Republic 



ILLUSTRATED 



By 

WILLIAM D. BOYCE 

PUBLISHER OF ''tHE SATURDAY BLADE," '^CHICAGO LEDGER/ 

"the FARMING BUSINESS," AND THE "INDIANA 

DAILY TIMES." 



RAND McNALLY & COMPANY 

CHICAGO NEW YORK 



F976' 

■73 ''^ 



Copyright, 1914 

BY 

VV. D. BOYCE 



X, 



>?>^ 



JAN -2 1915 



• CI.A393071 



INTRODUCTION 

As a people, for the (iovernnient of the United States con- 
sists of the sum total of its citizens, we have undertaken to 
do certain very large things for certain of our neigh1)or coun- 
tries ; namely, see that they do not indulge destructively in 
internal strife, in some cases see that they pay their national 
monetary obligations, and in all instances protect them against 
external attack. The countries in whose interests we have 
assumed voluntarily or by written treaty this generous and 
unusual task are Cuba, the Panama Republic, the Dominican 
Republic and Haiti. Being all involved in this task and its con- 
sequences, it is my opinion that we should thoroughly inform 
ourselves about these countries and their people. 

If you had undertaken to insure the peace and prosperity 
of several of your neighbors, surely you would want to know 
the habits and character of these neighbors, and how numerous 
were their offspring. Similarly, I believe that North Ameri- 
cans ought to know fully about these outlying countries over 
which we are exercising guardianship. In the hope of widen- 
ing information relative to them I am publishing this book. 

All of these countries are tropical, and largely inhabited by 
people of Spanish blood, Indians and negroes, or some fusion 
of the blood of these several strains. This fact adds to the 
difficulties and dangers of our task. These people, however, 
are somewhat more advanced than the general population of 
the Philippiiie Islands, wdiere we have been successful up to 
the present by taking hold of the problem with direct control, 
and where, in my opinion, we should remain 

Cuba, the largest of our dependencies, a country about the 
size of the great State of Pennsylvania and containing 2,300,000 
people, has present independence as a gift from us. At any 
time, should they involve themselves or us in serious ditticul- 
ties, they will almost automatically become a part of the United 
States. It is my per.sonal belief that they would ])e better (^ff 

vii 



viii INTRODUCTION 

under the Stars and Stripes, and that ultimately, since they 
have an increasing population of 670,000 blacks endowed with 
the franchise, they will, for safety's sake, have to become part 
of the great, stable United States. 

Haiti, the Black Republic, with its 6,528,000 productive 
acres and 2,500,000 people, mostly negroes, is, and has been 
for years, a scene of almost continuous turbulence. It is a 
signal example of a fourth-rate class of people attempting the 
extremely trying task of self-government. Long before this, 
had the United States not interfered to protect it and straighten 
out its troubles, some European power would have seized it 
and exploited it as a colony. Possibly it is wiser for us to 
indirectly govern it and shoulder its responsibilities than to 
actually take it over, but I doubt it. 

As for the Dominican Republic, another foster-child of 
ours, which occupies nearly two-thirds of the island of Haiti, 
we have gone so far as to put United States officials in charge 
of its custom collections, in order to prevent European powers 
from seizing it for debts. It is a rich piece of soil over 18,000 
square miles in area, inhabited by some 600,000 Creoles and 
Europeans mixed with Indian and negro strains of blood, and 
its chronic state is insurrection. As with Haiti, unquestionably 
these people would make greater progress and live happier 
lives if actually under our government and guidance. 

In the case of the Panama Republic, we have hopes that 
their experiment in self-government may prove successful. 
We have guaranteed them independence and peace, and with 
our protection and the civilizing influence of the great Canal in 
their midst, they should succeed. We wish them well. 

The pages that follow are a part of my larger work. United 
States Colonies and Dependencies, the matter of which first ran 
as Travel Stories in The Saturday Blade, one of our four pub- 
lications. Obtaining the photographs and material for the work 
took me on an 8,000 mile journey to Alaska, on trips to the 
Panama Canal Zone and the West Indies and on a journey 
around the world. If the result is a clearer understanding of 
our national duties and problems, I shall be satisfied. 



CONTENTS 

CUBA 

CHAI PER \ / PAGE 

I. HAVANA AND CIGARS ...... I 

II. SPONGES AND THE ISLE OF PINES .... 25 

III. ACROSS CUBA ........ 36 

IV. SANTIAGO AND THE ORIENTE . . „ . .49 

V. CUBA OF TOMORROW ..... 



THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 



I. A FOSTER-CHILD ....... 7^ 

II. ACROSS THE REPUBLIC ...... 86 

III. THE MECCA OF MECCAS ...... 95 



60 




THE REPUBLIC OF HAITI 

I. THE BLACK REPUBLIC . .... lOI 

II. PEOPLE, TOWNS AND RE.SOURCES . . . I lO 

III. THE REAL HAITIANS .... . I20 



THE PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 
OF PANAMA 

I. THE CANAL AND REPUBLIC ..... I32 

II. BUILDING AND OPERATION ..... I44 

III. TOLLS AND A FREE PORT ..... 155 

ix 



CUBA 

Area. 44,164 square miles, about the size of the State of Penn- 
sylvania — Population, i^is, ■^,3^-^,990; of this number 
671,477 are blacks — Chief resources, tobacco, sugar, coffee, 
cacao, tropical fruits, asphalt, copper, iron, tiinber, cattle, 
vegetables — Total imports, 19 13, $iiS,(j^7,ooo; exports, 
$146,676,000; imports from the United States, $70,^81,154; 
exports to the United States, $126,088,1 j^ — Miles of rail- 
way, about 2,075; ^'I'^^-s of telegraph line, 3,065 — Total 
debt, 19 1 4, $67,620,000 — Rural Guards, 5,2qS men; regular 
army, 11,105 — Navy, 2 cruisers, /j rcc'eniie cutters and 
steam launches — Capital, Havana, population, ^24,146 — 
President, General Mario G. Menocol. 

CHAPTER I. 

HAVANA AND CIGARS. 

IT WAS five o'clock in the morning. A great red sun in a 
bank of fog marked the entrance to Havana harbor. 
Morro's Hght flashed over the waters. We passed under grim 
gray forts. Bastion and cannon ! Bloodshed and clanking 
chain ! ( )ur old idea of Cuba ! 

"Great Scott, but this city's changed!" sighed the loquacious 
New York tobacco buyer, as he leaned over the rail. "Why, 
when I first sailed past Cabanas' guns, twenty years ago. this 
l)lace was as Spanish as a castanet. Look at the Alalecon 
tonight — you'll think you're in Atlantic City!" 

That first day I did not think Cuba's famed capital espe- 
cially attractive. I thought the harbor small, the town flat, the 
streets clean, but not picturesque. The place lacks the situa- 
tion and the individuality of Caracas, Lima and Rio de Janeiro. 

It is when night falls that the city charms. Now she is 
vivacious, sparkling. Rich and poor, young and old come into 
the parks to play. Dark-eyed beauties throng the boulevards. 
Music and laughter and the clink of glasses sound far into the 

I 



W- 




CUB.l 3 

night. Like a lily of the tropics, La Habana blooms under 
the stars. 

Next morning Monch, the tobacco buyer, offered to serve 
as guide. He hailed one of the coaches which swarmed about 
us and just then a courteous policeman handed him a card 
bearing the number of the coach and the telephone number 
of the chief of police — a municipal precaution against cab 
driver extortion. 

"There's certain things here you'll have to see," said 
Monch, "before we go down to the real show in Vuelta 
Abajo — the place which put Havana on the map. Suppose 
you may as well check oft' the old castles first.'' So we drove 
to La Fuerza. I quote my guide : 

"Hernando de Soto built this old fort way back in the 
sixteenth century. When he went West to discover the Mis- 
sissippi, he left his bride, Lady Isabel, behind. They say she 
hung over that rail for four years waiting his return. And 
he in a watery grave!" 

We crossed the bay to Morro Castle, which stands on guard 
where the harbor gate meets the sea. 







SOLDIERS MARCHING INTO OLD HAVANA FORTRESS, LA FUERZA, 
BUILT IN 1538. 



CUBA 5 

Again the guide: "Here, one hundred and tifty years ago, 
Velasco, the Brave, refused to surrender to the British and 
died a hero. Spain said that a ship in her navy should always 
bear his name. Dewey, you know, sank a gallant Velasco 
off Manila." 

We went on to Cabanas which stretches the entire length 
of the hill opposite Havana. 

"See the bullet marks up there on the wall? They call 
that 'the dead line." It's where the Cubans were lined up 
and shot by the Spaniards." 

When Alorro Castle was completed, three hundred years 
ago, Spain's King, so the story goes, stood on top of his castle 
in Madrid and was looking westward with his long-distance 
field glass. A bishop approached and asked the King what he 
was trying to see. 

The King replied, "We are dedicating Alorro Castle, in 
Havana." 




CATHEDRAL AT HAVANA, IN WHICH THE BONES OF COLUMBUS REPOSED 
UNTIL TAKEN TO SPAIN AT CLOSE OF SPANISH-.\MERUAN WAR. 



6 CUBA 

"But, oh, King," the bishop remarked, "Havana is three 
thousand miles away ! You can't see so far !" 

"Well," said the King, "I ought to be able to see Morro 
Castle, anyhow, for it cost sixty million dollars !" 

1 had had about enough of forts and suggested churches. 

"There are not any very interesting ones," said the man 
who knew the town. "There's the cathedral. You can look 
at a niche in the wall where the bones of Christopher Columbus 
used to rest. At least the Cubans say they were his bones. 
Down in Santo Domingo they say they were his son's. Anyway, 
they are not there any longer — were carried off to Spain when 
we took Cuba." 

We drove through Central Park, the pulsing heart of 
Havana, with its statue of Jose Marti, the Liberator, along the 
magnificent Prado with its double drive flanked by attractive 
homes ; down Obispo and up O'Reilly, narrow canvas-covered 
lanes, the main business thoroughfares. Here the shops are a 
woman's paradise — Spanish laces ; French embroideries ; Mexi- 




ENTRANCE TO THE TEMPLETE. HAVANA, A CHAPEL MARKING 
THE SITE OF THE FIRST MASS CELEBRATED IN HAVANA. 



cm. I 7 

can (lra\vii-\vi>rk ; Italian corals; Irish linen — a cosmopolitan 
exhibit, provincially (lis])laycd. 

1 was surprised to fnul so many pure-blooded Spaniards 
among" the merchants. They also do most of the banking, 
although there are some Canadian and American banks. One 
of tiie time-honored customs of the Spanish merchant is to 
eat his meals in his store. If you pass along the street at 
breakfast time, eleven o'clock, and look into the shops, you 
will see business suspended, the table s])read in the middle of 
the room and proprietor and clerks sitting down to their meal 
in the midst of their goods. They are good business men, and 
in commerce lies Spain's recontjuest of Cuba. 




*■ 

4 



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o STATUE OF TOSE MARTI, THE LIBERATOR, II.WANA. 



CUBA 




LOOKING DOWN THE PRADO, HAVANA. 



It is safer to drive than to walk through the narrow streets 
in the old part of the town. There are five thousand victorias 
in the city ; besides automobiles, taxicabs and the native giia- 
guas (omnibuses) and with electric cars scraping the curbs, 
the pedestrian has to be careful. 

And here arises the delicate question of the "right of way.'' 
There is no rule of keeping to the right, as in the United 
States. When two Cuban women meet, color of skin and 
glory of raiment determine the inner path — the one next the 
wall, where rain from the eaves doesn't splash. At the turn 
of a corner, I saw a very fat woman in pink standing midway 
of the walk, glaring at an equally fat woman in blue. Number 
Two won — her hair was straighter. Of course the ladies of 
the upper class drive. Cuba has long been noted for the beauty 
of her women. They are seen at their best on the fashionable 
promenade, the ]\Ialec6n, in the winter season, when the capital 
is crowded with American tourists. 



CUBA 



The rich tourist pays more for a steak at the Miramar than 
he does for the same cut at tlie best hotel in New York. But 
he gets a fine cHmate and fine touring roads for his money. 
If he is a sport he can attend the cock fight, play poker and 
even take a chance at faro and roulette — on the sly. Havana 
is almost the size of Washington, with 325,000 inhabitants, and 
one-third of them are negroes, exactly the same proportion as 
in our capital. The color line is not drawn so narrowly as in 
the United States, and many who are "slightly tinted" are 
passed for white. 

Although two years ago we read of a negro uprising in 
Cuba, we little understand the serious proportions it assumed. 
At many places American marines were landed, but the (Gov- 
ernment was unable to cope with 
the situation. The outbreak was 
the manifestation of the negroes 
for a national political party. 
Even Havana had its perilous 
hours. The negro population is so 
commingled with the whites that 
one did not know whether to trust 
his own servant. The hot-headed 
whites announced that on a certain 
Saturday afternoon and Sunday 
no negro should cross Central Park, 
in the heart of the city. Fortu- 
nately it rained as it had seldom 
rained before, and this was all that 
^aved Havana from a disgraceful 
i.ice riot. 

In June, 1914, the negroes in 
( )riente Province formed a political 
party, calling themselves Aiuigos 
del Pueblo (Friends of the People). 
The principal movers behind the 
organization are Lacoste and Surin, 
two of the Lieutenants under Gen- 
erals Estenoz and Yvonet, leaders 




A CUBAN NEGRESS, 



lO 



CUBA 



of the race uprising two years ago. The Generals were killed, 
but the lives of the Lieutenants were spared. 

The object of this negro party is to compel the whites to 
hand over more of the political offices of the country and the 
members even acknowledge such "high-minded motives" in 
their literature. They say that they did most of the fighting 
during the revolution and are entitled to a large per cent of the 
offices. 

The Cubans have forgiven Spain for shooting their patriots, 
but thev can never forgive the United States for abolishing 
the bull fight, cock fight and lottery. The two latter "indus- 








f«f 



:*Pw 



^ 







V 







A BASEBALL TEAM, HAVANA. 

tries" were resumed when the Cuban flag broke to the breeze, 
but they were too afraid of a third intervention to reinstate 
the bull fight. The high gambling game of jai-alai, which 
formerly operated a percentage concession with the Govern- 
ment, is still under the ban. 

This is purely a Spanish game originating in the Basque 
provinces, but bearing a resemblance to our handball. The 
professional players came from Spain and it was Cuba's most 
popular game of chance. 

The plan to make Havana the ]\Ionte Carlo of America 



CUBA 



1 1 



received a .surprising setback when, on December 31, 1912. 
President Gomez issued an order that the anti-gambhng laws 
should be enforced. There was consternation in the great 
"Winter Playground," and in the way of gambling it has not 
been so li\ely since, wdiich, however much certain C'ul)ans may 
gruml)le, is not a misfortune. 

There is one Northerner who never sees Cuba — Jack Frost 
— but by way of Palm Beach and the "ocean-going ferries" 
from Key West comes the American millionaire, bringing along 
his touring car, which is wisely admitted free of duty. The 
Cubans receive him kindly and proceed to absorb his loose 
change. He is dubbed locally, Pato dc Florida (Florida duck), 
and being naturally a "good spender" has earned the honor of 




SCENE IX THE I LAZA, llAN'ANA. 



CUBA 



13 



a poem in a Havana English paper — the first stanza running: 

Oh, the Florida Duck is a festive bird; 
The famous goose of whom ye've heard. 
That laid gold eggs, was a piker jay 
Compared to the subject of this here lay. 

The Country Club of Havana, having completed an eight- 
een-hole golf course, is naturally very popular with the "ducks.'* 

Probably the most interesting feature of Havana is its clubs. 
They are the largest social organizations in the world. The 
Asturian and the Clerks' Club have each over 30,000 names on 
their rolls and the Gallego follows with 24,000. Including the 
membership in the many smaller clubs, it is estimated that fully 
one-third of the population are within these organizations. 
As two-thirds of the people must be women and children, it is 




STATUE OF COLUMBUS AT THE PALACE, HAVANA, 



14 CUBA 

apparent that almost every man in Havana is a "clubman." 
Then, too, the most beautiful building in the capital today is the 
Clerks' Club. It occupies a whole square and cost $1,000,000. 
Its magnificent ballroom holds 3,000 couples at carnival time ; 
its dining-room has 200 tables ; and its billiard-room is the 
largest on earth. This club is unique, for while the dues are 
but $1.50 a month, each member has the privilege of the gym- 
nasium, baths and instruction classes ; the right to send his 
children to the club's kindergarten, private, grammar and 
high schools, and his wife to the department for expert instruc- 
tion in sewing, cooking and domestic science. The club has 
its own surgeons, oculists and dentists ; its own tubercular 
hospital and a private sanatorium for the insane. All this is 
covered by the $1.50 a month ! I believe they have to pay for 
the gold used by the dentist and the glasses prescribed by the 
oculist. Cubans have learned much from the Americans, but 
this cooperative club work is one of the things Americans 
might study with profit. 

One evening I joined a group of compatriots at a cafe. It 
was midnight and miles of such places, open to the street and 
ablaze with light, had begun to fill up. I noticed that half the 
Cubans who crowded the place were taking either cofifee or 
chocolate; the other half were having their one glass of rum 
and water, or a bottle of red wine. And that w^as the end of 
it. They seemed welcome to sit as long as they pleased over 
the one glass. No scurrying waiter to insist on another order. 
Drunkenness is not one of the sins to be charged to the account 
of the Cuban. The hard drinking is given over to the for- 
eigner. They tell of one American, who, during a birthday 
celebration, staggered to his feet as a cafe orchestra struck up 
"Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight." Noticing that the 
Cubans remained seated, he waved his arms and roared, 
"Stand up! you blamed Spickadees, an' salute the tune that 
made yer free !" 

However, my American friends were fairly temperate, and 
as some of them had lived many years in the country, I heard 
much that was of interest. They agreed that Havana had 



CUBA 



15 



■a,"'!a».^»«!««:-fr*.. 




l)CCome sufticient- 
ly Americanized 
to be pleasantly 
hospitable to 
iVmericans. This 
tlie\' credited to 
t h e " interven- 
tion" which had 
introdnced side- 
walks, abolished 
mosquitoes, pop- 
ularized rubber 
tires, buill elec- 
tric railways, in- 
troduced the sew- 
erage system, and 
ij^enerally made 




!fipl-t I ^ 



9 1 



,.»^« 



Havana more 
beautiful to the 
eye and nonof- 
f ensive to the 
nose. While still 
retaining its Span- 
ish character an;', 
Cuban jjeculiari- 
ties,the city shows 




.0. ' 



SOM1-: I'UIILU I'.riLDIXCiS OF H.WAXA. TO[>. I'LAZA 

hotel; left, stock exchange; kichit, produce 
exchange; bottom, new- tostoffice, 



CUBA t; 

many effects of the "Xorthcrn invasion." The Cuban belles 
even liave given up tlie use of pulverized egg sbells for face 
powder in favor of talcum. The world progresses even in 
Cuba, you see. 

Cuba's once fever-stricken capital now wins the record for 
low death rate among the cities of the world. But while they 
"die low," they certainly "live high." Last year the Govern- 
ment spent $38,000,000, or $15 for every man, woman and 
child under the flag, reckoning on a basis of a population of 
nearly 2,500,000. Our "billion-dollar Congress" cost us just 
$10 per capita, and the reformers cried "Fire!" Another rec- 
ord: Every Cuban pays $10 annually in customs duties. We 
pay $3.50 per capita and propose that it shall be \e?i. 

One-third of the Government expenditure last year was 
charged under the head of administration, for Cuba has a 
bumper crop of officeholders — professional politicians. Still 
they are not a contented lot, for their "fly in the ointment" is 
the knowledge that the "outs'' are continually scheming to 
oust them. 

Cuba elected a new President in 1913, and symptoms 
that an uprising would follow the ballot count soon disap- 




DRAWING-ROOM IN THE PRESIDENT'S PALACE. II.WANA. 



i8 CUBA 

peared. General Menocal was defeated at the polls in a form- 
er attempt to till the executive chair. He is a wealthy business 
man, and tits well the speciiication for "a good manager." He 
promised Cuba just what Cuba needed: curtailment of lavish 
expenditure, elimination of graft, reduction of tariff and all to 
the same end — making living cheaper and better — a wdse and 
equable distribution of the burdens of taxation. He drew $50.- 
000 a year for managing" the interests of the Sugar Trust in 
Cuba. The Presidency pays but $30,000. 

The calm following the election astonished the world. 
"Have the Cubans learned to be good losers?" was generally 
asked. It seems so. Perhaps the transplanting to Cuba of 
our baseball game has been a factor in bringing about this 
happy result. Our national game thrives on Cuban soil. It is 
played in every hamlet. Cubans take naturally to the sport 
and have become experts. They have even learned to abuse 
the umpire. I observed many evidences of progress in Cuba. 

As the very name of Cuba's capital means to the world a 
good cigar, I investigated the industr}- and found that there 




A REVIEW OF TROOP.S AT THE PALACE^ HAVANA. 



CUBA 



19 




GATEWAY TU COLON CE.METERV, HAVANA. 




THE ''lAI'REL ditch," HAVANA, WHERE CONDEMNED MEN 
WERE SHOT. 



20 



CUBA 



are five grades of tobacco grown in the country ; the strong 
heavy leaf in the east, growing better in the center of the 
island and reaching the climax in the famous Vuelta Aba jo 
section in the extreme west. 

I motored out to the west from Havana and found the 
roads as good as the climate — "Meester Magoon's roads" they 
are called by the Cubans. While all tobacco grown to the west 
of Havana is exported as Vuelta Abajo, the real "Vuelta" 
comes from a very small section in the heart of Pinar del Rio. 
This is one of the three most valuable tracts of land on the 
face of the globe. The other two places are that portion of the 
Rhine Valley where a special wine-making grape is grown ; and 
the Kimberley diamond district. What is the magic of this 
priceless tobacco ground? To the eye, absolutely nothing — 
dusty red loam on rather thin rocky hillsides. The ground is 




JsmasBaaeus 








1^1 



THE MANNER IN WHICH TOBACCO IS GROWN UNDER CHEESE- 
CLOTH IN CUBA. 



CUBA 



21 



fertilized with hay and the plants protected from the sun by 
cheesecloth. Still, neitiier science nor experience can tell 
just what makes \'ueha Abajo tobacco the acme of luxury. 

Anyway, if there is one thing the western Cuban does know, 
it is how to grow tobacco. With some of them, even the field 
hands, tobacco culture has been the business of the families 
for generations. These men insist that the plants must be 




EDUCATION AND ENTERTAINMENT. A READER AT WORK IN A TOBACCO 

FACTORY, HAVANA. 



watered by hand and with no vessel but an oil can. This may 
be the great secret. After the leaves are gathered they are 
hung up to dry until the color changes from green to chestnut. 
Then follows the sweating and fermenting processes. When 
finally cured, the leaves are baled and sent to the factories. 
The majority of these large establishments are located in 
Havana. They are enormous structures divided into roomy 
halls. In these halls the cigarcros sit back to back on long rows 
of double benches, the regulations not permitting them to face. 



CUBA 



23 



Machinery of any description is spurned, and they rely solely 
on the deftness of their lingers. The hest cigars go to the 
Czar of Russia, and sell for $7.50 each — ten cents a puff. 

A unique feature of the factories is the presence of a 
"reader" mounted on a high platform, who solaces weary hours 
by reading aloud from a collection of daily papers and maga- 
zines, selected by a committee. 

I learned that Cuba exported over $45,000,000 worth of 
cigars and tobacco last year, placing this industry second only 
to the sugar. While he exported 180,000,000 cigars, the 
Cuban smoked exactly the same number. Wkh true Latin 
politeness, before lighting his own cigar he gave one to the 
"stranger without.'" ( )ver $17,000,000 in leaf tobacco was 
exported, certainly enough to flavor a few billion more 
"smokes." But when it comes to cigarettes, Cuba's home con- 
sumption just shifts the decimal point over so far that it really 




A TOBACCO FARMKKS IIOMK, WESTPIRN CUBA. 



24 



CUBA 




A TOBACCO-CURING BARN, CUBA. 



becomes nervous. According to official figures, every man, 
woman and child in Cuba smokes nine boxes of cigarettes each 
month and consumes three boxes of matches in lighting them. 
Now who can deny that the production of smoke is Cuba's 
chief industry? 



CHAPTER II. 

SPONGES AND THE ISLK OF PINES. 
4 tT T THAT are you going to do for the next few days?" 

V V asked a com])anionable American whom I met in 
Havana. "Come along with me over to the Isle of Pines and 
ril show you a real Treasure Island — an old pirate strong- 
hold." 

This caught my fancy. "Pirates" and "Treasure" are 
magic words to the average American. When my friend 
offered a glimpse of the sponge industry as an added attraction, 
I asked how soon we could start. 

We could go by rail next day, he said, thirty miles to Bata- 
bano on the south coast, but the train "made" all the watering 
tanks. Recalling the splendid roads in Pinar del Rio, I sug- 
gested that we motor down, and to this he agreed. 

The chauft'eur with the forty-horsepower French car asked 
$15 for the journey, throwing in by way of a bait: "There's no 
speed limit, you know, on the country roads." As he paid 
forty-five cents a gallon for gasoline, we considered the fee 
reasonaljle. 

( )ut the wide Malecon we whirled, at considerably over the 
twelve-mile-an-hour city limit, receiving nothing more than a 
salute from the cycle policeman. On through \'edado, 
Havana's aristocratic suburb, with its long avenue of attractive 
homes set in luxurious gardens. Here the majority of the 
American colony reside. A fine road runs all the way to the 
south shore, now level, now broken by hills, but seldom ascend- 
ing a grade heavier than five per cent. It passes between 
thick clusters of Royal palms, those "feather dusters of the 
gods," native to Cuba. It was a Cuban palm, transi)lanted to 
Brazil in 181 2, which became the mother of those wonderful 

25 



26 



CUBA 



specimens that have made the Botanical Gardens of Rio de 
Janeiro famous. As I looked at them in Cuba they brought 
back memories of some of my most pleasant days in Brazil. 

The Cuban Government roads are nothing less than mag- 
nificent boulevards, wide, well crowned, without sharp curves, 
finished with macadam. We built many of them during the 
intervention and now the Cubans are keeping up the good 
work. We have built good roads first in our colonies and 
dependencies. W^e should get busy at home. 

A pinkish-reddish coloring is distinctive of western Cuba. 
The earth, the great carts drawn by oxen, the canvas covering 




ONE OF MANY PALM-LINED COUNTRY ROADS IN CUBA. 



28 CUBA 

the carts, the oxen themselves, [he garments of the people at 
work in the tobacco and pineapple fields — all blend into this 
terra-cotta tone. And in sharp contrast — waving green palms ; 
the Royal poinciana in flaring bloom ; rainbow-tinted houses, 
gayly caparisoned mules; song birds of gaudy plumage — a 
never-to-be-forgotten picture. 

We skirted great sugar plantations ; then little patches of 
garden truck, carefully tended for the Havana market. I 
never realized before how much the Cuban depends on the out- 
side world for foodstuffs. He bends every effort to raise 
record crops of sugar and tobacco and allows us to sell him 
shiploads of eggs and even canned vegetables. 

At one village, we stopped to look up "the store," as I had 
lost my cap in our mad flight. The clerk offered me his latest 
importation from the U. S. A. — a black woolen cap, lined with 
flannel and equipped with ear muffs, just the thing for the 
tropics ! Who says we Yankees are not out for the Latin- 
American trade ! 

I paid for my new headgear in Spanish silver, the only 
money accepted in the rural districts, although my American 
coin had been taken "without reluctance" in the capital. My 
traveling companion told me that during years spent in Cuba 
he had often carried five purses in his pocket at one time — ■ 
one dedicated to American silver; a second to American gold 
and paper ; a third to Spanish coin ; a fourth to Spanish silver ; 
a fifth to French gold. Here is a chance for an American 
manufacturer to send out a portable, cosmopolitan cash 
register. 

Batabano, a sleepy, canal- fretted town inhabited by sponge 
fishermen, is near the site of the first settlement of Havana in 
15 15, but the city was soon afterward moved across the island 
to its more favorable and healthful location. We kept on to the 
port of Surgidero, three miles distant, to learn all we could 
about "sponging." I had heard that the water off shore at 
this point is milk-white and that Columbus, putting in to cork 
a boat or kidnap an Indian, considered it such a curiosity that 
he filled a bottle, as part of his exhibit for King Ferdinand. 



CUBA 



29 



That opalescent sea has changed to crystal. Today the waters 
are noted for their clearness and from among the twilight 
depths of sunken coral reefs the sponges are taken. 

They are gathered in a most primitive fashion. Just "get 
the hook,'' two men in a hoat, one the sculler, the otlier the 
hooker, the latter assigned the work of detecting and catching 
the sponges. Over the side of the boat he leans, peering into 
the depths through his water telescope. The "sponge glass" 
is a bucket with a glass bottom used for dispelling reflection. 
The glass base is placed below the surface of the water and 

the hooker wears 
a wide-bri m m e d 
straw hat which 
cuts off a large pro- 
portion of direct 
ight when his head 
is thrust into the 
bucket. Through 
the glass the bot- 
tom can be seen to 
the depth of fifty 
feet, and when a 
sponge is sighted 




the operator sig- 
nals the sculler to 
maneuver the boat 
into position, and 
strikes with his 
long hooked pole. 



SCENES FROM THE SPONGE INDUSTRY AT 
BATABANO, CUBA. 



30 CUBA 

When brought to the surface, the sponge is black and 
sHmy. The laden boat is taken to a water pen — shallow water 
bordered by stakes — and the flowing tide gives the sponges a 
thorough washing. This requires about a week, when they 
are taken out, well squeezed and the living matter beaten out 
with sticks. The sponge of commerce is merely a skeleton, the 
supporting framework which once gave strength and form 
to the gelatinous tissues of the living creature. 

After drying, the sponges are again washed and sorted 
according to variety. And now comes the most interesting 
performance. The various buyers gather to inspect the exhibit, 
writing a separate bid for each pile. An official, appointed by 
the spongers, collects the bids and reads them off, awarding 
the lot to the highest bidder. The purchasers now forward 
their goods to packing warehouses where they are again cleaned 
and clipped into salable shape. The trimmed sponges are 
sorted for size and quality, pressed into bales, covered with 
burlap, and sent on their way to the near and far places of the 
earth. 

The American sponge fisheries are confined to the Carib- 
bean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico, and contribute more than 
two-thirds of the world's supply by weight, although the 
Mediterranean product leads in value, because of quality. 

An intelligent Cul)an buyer in Batabano told me that 1,500 
men in the town are engaged in sponge fishing and 500 more 
in trimming and marketing. He said that some of the fisher- 
men dive for sponges, but that the sharks make this method 
dangerous. Over in Florida they wear a regular diving suit, 
but the "Spongers' Union" of Batabano will not permit its use 
as it tends to exterminate the sponge. The man was some- 
thing of a mathematician, and had figured out that Batabano's 
annual output, worth half a million dollars gold, could absorb 
over two million gallons of water. 

I boarded the little steamer Cristobal Colon on one of 
her tri-weekly trips to the Isle of Pines, sixty miles due south — 
a ferry-like voyage over a shallow sea. 1 made the acquaint- 
ance of a much-traveled Cuban who had lived in the United 



CUILI 31 

States and spoke F.nglish fluently. He referred with great 
pride to the fact that his countrymen had just raised a fund to 
buy a home for Capablanca, the famous Cuban chess champion, 
and seemed disappointed that I had not heard much of the 
gentleman ; or of Cuba's great long distance runner — I think 
the name is Carvajal — who ran "second to Dorando at Rome" 
— or of Ramon Fonts, whom he termed "the world's amateur 
champion fencer." However, I rose in his estimation when I 
mentioned having once seen the great Cuban, Alfredo de Ore, 
who for years has been the world's pool champion. 

We sailed at seven in the evening, scheduled to reach the 
Isle of Pines early next day. It was a perfect night, llie 
constellations glistened like diamonds in the clear tropic sky 
and a cool breeze fanned us as we glided over a calm, moonlit 
sea. I turned in reluctantly to find a comfortable cabin, even 
equipped with running water. 

Nueva Gerona, our morning port, still retains its Spanish 
aspect. There is no sign from the sea of the hustling Ameri- 
can invasion. .So this was Treasure Island — the very isle 
from which the most ferocious of that pack of sea wolves of 
the seventeenth century sallied forth to attack the lumbering 
Spanish galleons laden with Incan gold, the loot of Peru! 
They left a heritage of buried treasure tales, but there is no 
authoritative report of unearthed riches. Not the buried 
wealth of pirates, but sturdy American enterprise is making a 
paradise of this little isle today, proving that the real treasure 
lies in the fertility of the soil. 

How came our fellow countrymen here? "Once u])on a 
time," about twelve years ago, a timber hunter was attracted 
over from Cuba by rumors of vast mahogany and cedar forests. 
In crossing the island he sensed the possibilities of its broad val- 
leys and bought 17.500 acres for $200, then associated other 
Americans with him and turned the island into a modern real- 
estate scheme. 

After the Spanish-American War, President McKinley and 
Secretary Hay believed the island to be American territory, 
and so did the settlers who flocked in. Then came the opinion 



32 



CUBA 




H. A. CHRISTY S ESTATE, ISLE OF PINES. 



of President Roosevelt and Secretary Root that the lesser 
island belonged to Cuba. The Piatt amendment declared the 
question of title open for adjustment and the matter was later 
arranged by treaty, giving Cuba title to the island in exchange 
for Cuban sites for United States naval stations. But this has 
not yet been affirmed by the United States Senate. And so, 
while the flag of Cuba flies over the public buildings, the Stars 
and Stripes decorate the roof-tree of ninety-five per cent of all 
the property holders who have converted wide grazing lands 
into rich citrus orchards, after years of patience and toil. 

The 3,000 Americans on the island come from all parts of 
the States — many of them are from western New York, Ohio, 
Michigan and Wisconsin. As in other pioneer colonies, they 
have brought along the church, school and printing press. 
During the intervention, $150,000 was spent in building one 
hundred miles of highway, and today there are over one hun- 
dred automobiles in commission. 

There are 6,000 acres of citrus fruit under cultivation. I 
have never tasted more delicious oranges, and the grapefruit 



CI 'BA 



33 



is in a class In- itself, ll is the market price of grapefruit 
which (leterniines the real prosperity of the settlement. Here 
there are half a million pineai)ple plants, the pineapple, by the 
way. being indigenous to the Americas. A pineapple weighing 
fifteen pounds is not a curiosity in this region, and none is 
shipped weighing less than seven pounds, bringing $i and 
$1.50 each in our market. The Pineros ship all they can 
and "what they can't they can," at least they plan to erect a 
cannery very soon. 

The name 'Tsle of Pines" was not deri\ed from the pine- 
api)le, however. It is the 'Tsle of Pine Tree," for here the 
stately pine grows side by side with the coquettish palm. The 
brand new hotel in Nueva Gerona was tilled with visitors from 
the States. In the shops we saw evidence of Yankee occupa- 
tion — there was everything from spades to ice-cream soda, 
cured hams to chewing gum. We motored over to Santa Fe, 
a favorite health resort for wealthy Havanese for nearly a 
century. The two mineral springs, magnesia and iron, were 








A FIELD OF PINEAPPLES. I.SLE OF PINES. 



34 CUBA 

even known to the Indians. Tlie bottled water is sold all over 
Cuba. 

In Santa Fe we found the people greatly excited over the 
news that the secretary of public instruction in Havana had 
issued an order limiting the teaching of English in public 
schools to the large cities. A scarcity of teachers was given 
as the reason. As the most of the school children in the Isle 
of Pines are "out and out Americans," they naturally prefer 
saying "six times six" in English. I heard an original dis- 
course on the language question from an American who had 
lived ten years in Havana before becoming a Pinero. 

"Do you know^ I like these people," he said. "The trouble 
with most Americans is that they don't imderstand the Cubans, 
can't speak their language. When I first came down I could 
only speak a little and some of the gringos used to josh me 
about having learned my Spanish on a phonograph with the 
wax records too close to the fire. But that didn't worry me, 
and I just kept plugging away until I could ablar wnth the 
best of them. Now I get their viewpoint. They resent our 
insisting on their learning our difficult, harsh language. I 
recall a night some years ago when I was dining with Cubans 
and a discussion arose regarding the comparative beauty of 
English and Spanish — Shakespeare zrrsiis Cervantes. I had 
just put up quite a plea for my own tongue when a man across 
the table asked the English name of the dish before him, and 
I knew the jig was up. He w^as eating caiinirones. as smooth 
and liquid a lot of vowels as you can find. W'hen I came out 
with 'shrimps,' they all were convulsed with laughter and 
nearly broke their jaws trying to pronounce the w^ord. I was 
out in the first round !" 

I learned that the Isle of Pines is in two sections divided by 
a swamp — two-thirds a rolling country ; the remaining 300,000 
acres to the south, a jungle enveloping a wealth of hardwood. 
The men engaged in felling the trees and marketing the logs 
are mostly "Caimaneros," West Indian English of various 
shades from the Cayman Islands, 150 miles away. These men 
take a turn at hunting the tortoise, valuable for its shell, and 



CUBA 35 

also add to their incomes by catching young parrots which 
swarm the woods in June and July. 

The magnet which has attracted the Anglo-Saxon to this 
tropical pine-land is the equable climate. The winters are 
delightful and even the summer "has references." Fresh 
trade-winds blow oft" the Caribbean. 

I enjoyed my visit to these transplanted compatriots of 
ours. They went there with hearts full of hope and worked 
out their own salvation, transforming a Spanish penal colony 
into a prosperous American community. Whether it be the 
Cuban flag or the Stars and Stripes which eventually floats over 
pine and palm, the Yankee has here proved to the w^orld that 
he is a first-class colonist. 



CHAPTER III. 

ACROSS CUBA. 

THE tobacco buyer and the man from Kentucky saw me off 
at the Central Station when I left Havana to cross Cuba. 

"Don't miss the caves of Matanzas!" "Be sure to ride in 
a volanta!" "Remember me to San Juan Hill!" These and 
many other parting admonitions they laughingly gave me. 

The express leaves the capital daily for Santiago de Cuba, 
540 miles away, twenty-four hours in a Pullman. I broke the 
journey at a number of places, my first stop being Matanzas, 
two and a half hours from Havana. Here there are two noted 
excursions for the traveler, one to the summit of a nearby hill 
for a view of the famous Yumuri Valley ; the other to the caves 
of Bellamar. 

I searched about the town for a volanta, the long-shafted, 
high-wheeled vehicle once typical in Cuba, but now rarely seen 
even in the country At last I found a somewhat dilapidated 




THE VOLANTA, A CUBAN CARRIAGE, ONCE MUCH USED 
ON THE ISLAND. 



36 



CUBA 



37 



sample. One horse is in the shafts and the driver rides on a 
second attached by traces. I'lie cart is adapted for rough 
cross-country riding and was practical in the days of poor 
roads. The sensation is a bit "weird." My head was below 
the u])])er rim of the wheels as we bounced up the Cumbre 
which is crowned by the old hermitage of Montserrate. Within 
this quaint structure is a reproduction of the shrine in the 
monastery of Montserrate, Spain, done in cork. Man)- hand- 
some and expensive votive offerings have been deposited here 
and thousands of persons visit the hermitage yearly. 

T confess 1 was disappointed in the much-advertised Yumuri 
V^alley as viewed from this point. The great naturalist and 
traveler, Humboldt, called it "the most beautiful valley in 
the world," or something equally extravagant. It is a pretty 
piece of country, clothed in emerald cane and tasseled with 
stately palms, but I have seen many finer valleys in tropical 
America. 

The caves of Bellamar resemble others I have visited — the 
same remarkable stalactite formations. You think you are in 




DOCKS AND WAREHOUSES, MATANZAS, CUBA. 



CUBA 



39 



fairylatul. or at the New York llii)i)0(lronie duriiij; the tinale; 
all the bewildering shades are there, minus the fairies. 

On the whole, the best thing about IMalanzas is the view 
of the city itself from the heights, its multi-colored houses, 
roofed with tiles, hill-encircled and river-girded, beside a deep 
blue sea. 

Matanzas, with its 36.000 inhal)itants, is a commercial city 
of much importance. A fort, so obsolete that it was useless at 




IN A CANE-FIELD, INTERIOR OF CUUA. 



the time of the S-panish-.Vmerican War. once protected the 
harbor. United States battleships bombarded Matanzas in 
April. 1898. but withdrew after killing one mule. 

Soon after leaA-ing the citv we passed a sisal ])lantation, 
fenced in by giant cacti ; then held after field of cane. The 
world has not only to thank Cuba for her gift of rare tobacco. 
but owes her a vote of thanks for a bountiful sugar crop. 
Sugar has become a necessity to every civilized human being 
and its consumption during the past century is a most striking 



40 



CUBA 



evidence of a luxury evolving into a real need. In fact, great 
doctors and scientists assert that the plentiful use of sugar is 
one of the best preventatives of alcoholic drunkenness, contain- 
ing, as it does, an unusual amount of natural alcohol which 
does not intoxicate. Moral, when tempted to take a drink, eat 
candy instead and escape the evils of whisky. 

As the civilized world cannot do without sweets, Cuba has 
a claim on civilization, having sent out 2,250,000 tons of sugar 
last season. Fully 99 per cent comes to the United States, as 
we have allowed 20 per cent reduction of duty. The Cubans 
are more than a bit worried over their status when the "free 
sugar" date arrives. 

If Cuba "cubed" her sugar crop, it would reach billions of 
cubes, enough to give every inhabitant of our country eight 
cubes a day. Of course we pay well for it ; $100,000,000 was 
its value on leaving its native heath, and the decimal point 
surely stepped to the right before we got our tongs on it. The 
sugar industry is the biggest thing on the island, amounting to 




LOADING CANE ON CARS ON A CUBAN 
SUGAR PLANTATION. 



CUBA 



4T 



over two-thirds the total value of exports. Sugar plantations 
or "centrals" are all over the country, a bit scattered to the 
west, decidedly bunched in Santa Clara province, the heart of 
Cuba, and still numerous in the eastern section. 

I stopped to visit a sugar estate and was welcomed by the 
American manager, who told me that fully four-tifths of all 
the plantations are owned or managed by Americans. He said 
that our country-men lia\'e about $200,000,000 invested in Cuba, 
and nearly $60,000,000 of it is in sugar. Over one million 
acres are given over to the production of honey-laden cane, 
twice the area devoted to the crop when Spain left the island. 

In the mills the laborers are Chinese, negroes, Spaniards 




TRAIN LOADED WITH SUGAR CAXE IX THE MOl'NTAINS OF CUBA, 



42 CUBA 

and highly paid American chemists and engineers. When the 
season ends, thousands of Spaniards embark by the shipload 
for Spain to spend the "dead" season with their families, 
returning at the commencement of the new crop. One of the 
largest sugar estates in the world is in Cuba, the "Chaparra," 
with 150,000 acres under cultivation. Many Cubans "raise 
cane" on the companies' land, selling the crop by weight to the 
mill. In 1912 these cane-raisers, colonos, had a bit of hard 
luck, for while the crop was large, the cane was light-weight 
though rich in sugar, so "heads won" — a prize to the com- 
panies. 

At Santa Clara I changed cars for Cienfuegos, "City of a 
Hundred Fires," on the south coast, which ships more sugar 
t^an any other port on the island. Cienfuegos Bay is said by 
naval experts to be one of the finest in the world, capacious, 
land-locked and tranquil. 

Here, as elsewhere on the island, I heard English spoken. 
Many educated Cubans understand it even if they will not 
speak it. Times have changed since the day when a hungry 
American tried to order a beefsteak in a Cienfuegos hotel and 
couldn't make the waiter understand. At last he took out his 
notebook and drew a picture of a cow. "Si, si. aJiora yo 
entcndo!" cried the waiter, rushing ofif. A few moments later 
he returned, proudly bearing a ticket to the bull fight ! 

In Cienfuegos my room overlooked the next door patio. I 
could not help seeing a bit of middle-class life. The ladies 
rocked and gossiped all day, but I'll confess they never forsook 
their needles. A small boy about ten years old was nurse to 
the baby and seemed also to serve as a sort of a "he-chamber- 
maid." About four in the afternoon the ladies appeared greatly 
bedecked and moved into the parlor to look out through the 
barred windows. In the evening there was more patio gossip 
and a very squeaky phonograph, and then the scnorita favored 
us with several instrumental selections. 

The scnorita marries the very first chance she has and wins 
a rocker and a patio of her own. Her life lacks the breadth 
and action of girls of the United States of the same station. 



cm. I 43 

She does not ciny the u[)per-class C"ul)an women who travel 
and wear ]*arisian gowns. No, she onl}- asks for a phonograph 
and a sewing maehine, maybe a trip to Havana. She becomes 
a devoted, if not a very intelligent, mother. Peace is hers if 
Pedro then tends sho]:) faithfully and keeps away from revolu- 
tionary talk. I don't believe this class of C"ul)an girls ever 
heard of a suffragette ! 

In regard to railroads, Cuba is one of the best served of the 
American republics, considering the country's size. It also 
was one of the first to have a railway, being twelve years ahead 
of its mother, Spain. Of the 2,075 niiles of standard track 
on the island, 1,000 is British owned. American capital built 
the road from Santa Clara to Santiago, 607 miles, and now is 
reaching out, building 250 miles of new road across the prov- 
ince of Camaguey from north to south. This action has brought 
out a protest from the British railway interests who claim that 
it interferes with existing British concessions. Idie Cuban 
Government denies this, and it is up to the British Government 
to take the next step. 

I wrote in a previous chapter of the American fruit grow- 
ers on the Isle of Pines, but they are here at the Cuban railway 
stations, too. You can never mistake the man from North 
Dakota, although raising oranges is a new game to him. Here- 
tofore, Cuba's orange crop has found a local market, but the 
island fruit is beginning to appear in the United States. 

In the full development of her agricultural possibilities lies 
Cuba's golden future. Efl:orts on the part of the Government 
to promote agriculture cannot fail to attract the necessary 
immigration. There are large tracts which can be cultivated at 
less expense and with greater profit than in the irrigated sec- 
tions of the United States. There is also the best sort of 
opportunity for the small farmer, who can raise potatoes, for 
instance, as fine as any from Bcrnmda, while Cuba now buys 
half a million dollars' worth. 

And corn! \\"hy not market it at a big profit? Now it is 
only raised for fodder. What we call farming in the United 
States is almost unknown in Cuba. ( )utsidc of the big planta- 



CUBA 



45 



lions and the lln-i\ini,r new orchards, the happy-f^o-lucky coun- 
tryman raises bananas, sweet potatoes and ytica, a httle rice, 
perhaps, and lets it go at that. He ekes out his larder with 
game. Winter is the Cuban hunting season. Game then is 
plentiful througliout the island and landowners, with few 
exceptions, allow sjiortsmen the freedom of their estates. 
Some sections abound with deer and there are miniature wild 
boar, also ducks, doves, quail and pheasants. There are no 
poisonous snakes and no fierce jaqnars. A little tree rat. the 




A CORNER OF THE PATIO GARDEN OF A HOUSE IN CAMAGUEY, CUBA. 



46 CUBA 

liittia, lias it mostly his own way, unless you count a relic of 
past ages, the aliniqni, a sort of shrew now very rare, and 
found only in Cuba and Haiti. 

.\t Caniaguey, one of my Meccas on the island, is Dr. 
Paul Karutz, who recently resigned as industrial agent for the 
Cuba Railway to take up some special w^ork for the Spanish- 
American Iron Company at Daiquiri, at whose mines are io,ooo 
people. He is a distinguished chemist, having been the first to 
call attention to the fact that powdered Hmestone or coral, 
when burned and applied to soil, does wonderful work in 
making plant food available. Dr. Karutz, who was a German 
army officer and has traveled all over the world, believes that 
when the natives are educated in the proper methods of tilling 
the soil the country will be able to supply all our Eastern sea- 
board with vegetables during the summer months. By feeding 
sugar cane and pressed peanut, cottonseed or hnseed oil cakes, 
he boasts that he can raise pork at one and one-half cents a 
pound and beef at two cents a pound. These experiments are 
to be carried out at Daiquiri, where he has volunteered to farm 
10,000 acres scientifically to show the possibilities of agricul- 
tural development. Sugar is grown scientifically now in Cuba, 
but other products in most instances are cultivated as they 
were two or three hundred years ago. 

Camaguey's rehabilitated Indian name suits the quaint old 
town better than its former Spanish title of Puerto Principe. 
The settlement was originally founded on the coast, but was 
moved inland as early as 1530 to escape the visitation of pirates. 
Henry Morgan and his bloodthirsty crew found it out and 
sacked it, however, one hundred years later. Camaguey looks 
its age. It is old and hoary. It reminded me of Cartagena, 
Colombia ; the same squatty houses, the same parrot-cage win- 
dows, projecting and barred. I half expected to meet De 
Soto, Porcallo and all the other gallant sixteenth-century 
"boys" at each turn in the street. 

Camaguey impressed me as the most aristocratic town on 
the island, a little more conservative and Cuban than the 
others. The pro\ince has long been noted for its good blood 



48 CUBA 

and handsome women. Also for its live stock — cattle, riding 
horses, and bulls for fighting in the Spanish days. 

Keeping on to the east, I found the country more verdant ; 
it began to look really tropical. A vine-laced forest borders 
every clearing. Giant ccibas look on Royal palms which 
in turn tower over palmettos. A tree more vividly green than 
the others was pointed out to me as the mahogany, and I saw 
houses built entirely of mahogany logs. The most of the 
dwellings, however, are the native bohios, thatched huts 
built of palmetto, just the sort the Indians used when Columbus 
discovered the island. Bohio is the aboriginal name. An- 
other Indian word, or prefix rather, very common still, is 
giia — guajiro, the typical country man, lazy and good- 
natured; maiiigua, the thick bush where the insurgents used to 
hide. They pronounce the gua as though it were 7vali. 
It was after dark when we passed the famous trocJia line, the 
fortified Spanish trench which crossed the island. I could 
dimly make out the narrow-gauge railroad which now par- 
allels it. 

The wreck of the Maine no longer lies in Havana harbor. 
A noble monument in its honor will some day grace the 
capital. In western Cuba they live in the present and put 
away the past. But in the eastern country Spanish-American 
War tales come to life. I forgot all about sugar and tobacco 
and the other agricultural possibilities of the island as the 
train slid down to Santiago Bay. Every man who loves the 
Stars and Stripes comes here for the express purpose of taking 
off his hat to San Juan Hill! 



CHAPTER IV. 



UTT7EWI 
V V the n 



SANTIAGO AND THE ORIENTK- 
"E WILE reach Cuba in twenty-five minutes,'' said 
man with the plaid cap, looking at his watch. 

As I had already been some time in Cuba, I cast an incjuir- 
ing eye on the speaker, who was a Britisher. 

"Ah! you do not understand! You call it 'Santiago de 
Cuba,' or 'Santiago,' I fancy! Here we just say 'Cuba,' don't 
you know I And "Cuba" is less Americanized and a blooming 
sight more picturesque than Havana," continued the man. 

It was dark when the train rumbled into Santiago where 
I w^as accosted by the usual band of piratical cochcros. The 
runner from the "(iran" Hotel Venus" caught me and we jolted 
through narrow cobble-paved streets to the hostelry facing the 
plaza. Here 1 found a bedroom adorned with a real bathtub, 
set in an alcove, and a sort of open-air restaurant overlooking 
the charming little j^ark. "Cuba" was wide awake! 



=--^-1 




MORRO CASTLE, BUILT IN 1664. AT ENTRANCE OF SANTI.\GO HARBOR. 

49 



50 



CUBA 




less cabs with 
clanging bells rat- 
tled past. News- 
boys, and lottery 
ticket sellers also, 
screamed their 
wares. T h e c a- 
thedral c h i m c s 
added their note to 
the din. If you 
think a big Ameri- 
can hotel noisy, just 
try t h e "G r a n' 



The band "um- 
ta-ta-ed" g a y 1 y. 
Hatless senoritas 
chatted under giant 
laurel trees, coquet- 
ting with s 1 i m 
young men who 
walked 'round and 
'round the square 
in the good old 
S ij a n i s h w a y, 
"making the goo- 
goo-eye." Number- 




STREETS IN SANTIAGO, CUBA. 



CUBA 



51 



Motel \'enus." J nianaged to doze at two a. m., Init the street 
cries broui^ht nie back to the balcony at five. 

The liritisiier was right. Santiago is by far the most 
picturesque of Cuban cities ; and with its massive old Morro 
Castle, built in 1664 and no longer formidable, and the numer- 
ous other famous buildings and places in it and near it, it is 
rich in ancient, as well as in modern history. From here De 
Soto started overland to Havana on his way to Florida ; from 
here Cortez sailed forth to conquer Mexico. Sacked by 
pirates ; jarred by earthquakes ; invaded ; burned ; the "Very 
Noble and \'ery Loyal"" city lived on, a fit setting for a later 
war-drama. 

Tiled balconies look down on narrow streets, flanked by 
walls every color of the rainbow. Indigo and orange, scarlet 
and sea-green are fair samples of the painter and decorator's 
favorite combinations. But in spite of its bizarre appearance, 
this is a busy commercial town, the throbbing heart of the 
Oriente, as the natives call eastern Cuba. They themselves 
are Orientales and there are 50,000 of them in Santiago. 
Their hope is to make this a pretentious shipping port and they 
plan to put $1,000,000 into harbor improvements. 

In a drive about town, some one pointed out to me the 
place where Adelina Patti, the singer, made her New World 
debut. She landed here on her way to New Orleans and sang 




THE WALL AG.\IN.ST WHICH THE \'ICTIM.S OF THE "viRGINIUS' 
EXPEDITION WERE SHOT, SANTIAGO. 



52 CUBA 

at a local club accompanied by musicians who were her fellow 
voyagers. 

The next landmark was a dreary stretch of wall. Men were 
lined up here and shot, of course, the popular Spanish pastime! 
Here the Americans of the ship Plrginius were murdered. It 
was during Cuba's Ten Years' War with Spain. The Vir- 
ginius, claiming American registry, but suspected of being a 
filibuster, was captured by a Spanish gunboat off Jamaica and 
taken to Santiago, where fifty of her officers and crew were 
summarily shot. This incident brought us at the time to the 
verge of war with Spain. 

A bright-faced boy offering to sell us lottery tickets chased 
away these grewsome memories. He was greatly excited over 
the late winnings. Three major prizes, within the month, had 
come to Santiago. H the Cuban has any pronounced hope, it 
is that he may some day win a substantial prize in this "national 
gamble." It takes all his loose change and cuts down his food 
allowance. He can bet on the cock fight only on Sundays and 
holidays, but he can add to his international assortment of 
lottery tickets any day. 

The real "show," to my mind, was the fish market. Here, 
on great stone slabs, the multi-colored fish are attractively 
displayed, every sort you can imagine. There are six hun- 
dred varieties in Cuban waters and practically all the "schools" 
send delegates to the market. The high-priced ones are kept 
alive in big tanks and it is quite a sight to watch the catch of 
a selected fish. The tradesman goes after it with a small hand 
net while the purchaser provides continuous identification of 
the victim. The great pargo (red snapper) is one of the most 
popular. 

The most delicious thing in the way of eatables in Cuba is 
a water ice made from the guanahana, or sour-sop. The 
Cubans, like all people of Spanish blood, are very fond of 
ices. They serve them with spiral wafers which are often 
used in place of spoons. Exceptionally fine jelly is made here 
from guava, paste more often than jelly. Much of it finds its 
way to our market. 



54 



CUBA 



I saw a strange sight in the city prison — male convicts 
knitting stockings and crocheting hice. The prisoners are per- 
mitted to send their hanchwork to their wives, who sell it 
toward the support of the family. Convict-made lace is popu- 
lar with the tourists. 

I visited one of the schools which are still operated, after a 
fashion, on the system Uncle Sam transplanted from Ohio. 
There are no people anywhere who have such faith in school 
education as a cure-all for every human defect as we. And 




..J^. "^^■!^|*'«|p^i5,S:. v^ISS ili!|fij 



THE CATHEDRAL, SANTIAGO, CUBA. 

unquestional)ly we do not err in puttiiig a high value on 
schools. However, the C"ubans api)arcntly received an over- 
dose and the patient turned against it, although he is still taking 
the prescription. On the whole, they have been benefited. 

Facing the plaza in Santiago is the cathedral, an imposing 
structure, the largest in Cuba. It is the third to occui)y the 
site, having been erected in 1690. Within its walls lies buried 
Diego \'elasf|ucz, founder of seven cities, who died in 1522. 



CUBA 



55 



Other men who car\ctl ihcu names high on the waH of Cuban 
history are interred in Santiago's cemetery, among them being 
Marti, the great patriot, and Pahua, the first president. 

It was Alarti wdio inspired the outbreak that preceded the 
Spanish-American War. War was declared with the mother 
country February 24, 1895, and Marti died on the field of 
battle that same year, but his protecting soul seemed to hover 
over the banner of the single star, which he had helped give 
to the breeze. It would do no good to tell now of the bloody 
years that followed, of the starving time, when the peasants 
were gathered into camps and allow'ed to die of hunger. The 
brutalities practiced by the Spaniards surpass belief, and the 
Cubans retaliated with atrocities. The United States would 
have had to interfere soon in Cuban afifairs in the name of 
humanity. The destruction of the Maine focused attention 
on the island and fanned the flames of our just indignation. 
As a result we liberated Cuba. 

The two show places around Santiago are Boniato Summit, 




THE BLOCK-HOUSE AND MONI'.MEXT, SAN JItAN TIILL, 
SANTIAGO. 



56 



CUBA 



for a wonderful view, and San Juan Hill. I motored first up 
Boniato to look the countr\- oxer. A splendid road winds up 
the mountain, built during General Leonard \\'ood's regime 
and called "Wood's Folly," since it was expensive and leads 
nowhere in particular. I, for one, approved of the outlay, as 
I looked down from 1,500 feet over verdant hill and vale, 
with Santiago Bay gleaming in the distance. 

From Boniato I drove to 
El Caney, where we won a 
glorious victory. The old 
church which was riddled 
by shot and shell has been 
repaired, hence it is not so 
interesting to travelers as 
formerly. 

I drove on to San Juan 
Hill, though you can ride ( 



K 




THE PEACE TREE. 

out on the trolley. 
if you prefer. A 
veteran of the col- 
ored troops that 
distinguished them- 
selves here shows 
visitors over the 
historic battle- 
ground. He led me 



RO>AI, PALMS, THE TOP OF ONE OF WHICH 

WAS SHOT AWAY IN BATTLE, 

SAN JUAN HILL. 



CUBA 




GIVING A CUBAN BABY A DRINK. 




A MILKING SCENE IN CUBA. 



58 CUBA 

to the Peace Tree, the giant ceiba under which the Spanish 
General, Toral, surrendered to General Shafter July 17, 1898. 
We walked up San Juan Hill, where Theodore Roosevelt 
charged to the Presidency. From the old block-house on the 
heights there is a most comprehensive view, and my guide 
pointed out the places of greatest interest, giving me a graphic 
description of the battles in which he had participated. All of 
the main battlefields of the region are now comprised in a 
public park, visited by thousands. 

Any one who thinks the Santiago campaign was a holiday 
outing for the American soldier should visit these battlefields. 
It is a task for a man to scramble up either San Juan Hill or 
Kettle Hill today. The Americans fought their way up the 
heights through barb-wire fences and cactus hedges, under a 
withering fire and won. This bravery was unquestionably of 
the first class. 

Twelve miles from Santiago is the village of Cobre, famed 
for the shrine of "Our Lady of Cobre," patron saint of Cuba. 
Tins little image has been closely identified with the history 
of the island ever since the opening years of the sixteenth cen- 
tury when Alonso de Ojeda, most daring of the followers of 
Columbus, brought it to the New World from Spain as his 
special safeguard against ill fortune. Through many vicissi- 
tudes the sacred Virgin has been preserved and pilgrims come 
from all over the island to worship at her shrine. 

Cobre is the Spanish for copper, and the copper mines here 
have been worked since 1530; $50,000,000 has been taken out 
and the present American company is shijjping over 6,000 tons 
of metal monthly. 

As I passed along a road, I met a long string of laden 
ponies jogging in from the country, each tied to his neighbor 
by the tail. At the rear of the train, dust-covered and alto- 
gether miserable, was a rebellious red and white calf, actively 
dodging the hoofs of his pacemaker. A group of black and 
tan youngsters playing in a doorway cheered him lustily. 
They looked a healthy lot of hopefuls, free from the dreaded 
hookworm once so prevalent in Porto Rico. 



CLJB/1 59 

I was told in Sanliai^o that all Cuban property holders 
favor annexation. As one man pnt it. "\'ou han*;- a C'nhan 
np by his boots and if a peseta falls from his poekets he's an 
annexationist!"' But after talking- with many influential 
Cubans. 1 came to the contrary conclusion. While some fear 
that annexation is the ultimate fate of the island, all seem 
tired with the ambition for a successful national career. It is 
natural that they should wish to keep their hard-earned free- 
dom — to stand before the world as an independent nation. 

Twice the L'nited States has had to intervene. The pos- 
sibility of a third intervention hangs over every Cuban like a 
pall. He realizes that it would almost surely mean annexation 
to the United States. However, this would be the best thing 
that could befall him. No other nation on earth would do 
what we have done for Cuba, but without the protecting arm 
of Uncle Sam she could not long remain a nation under her 
own flag. 



CHAPTER V. 

CUBA OF TOMORROW. 

ONE gets a glimpse of the Cuba of the future at Nipe 
Bay — Cuba when it sliall have been changed by the 
touch of industry's magic wand. I raih-oaded down to see 
Uncle Sam's great naval station at (iuantanamo Bay, went to 
Baracoa on a coastwise steamer, then sailed on to Nipe Bay, 
returning to Santiago by rail. Among all the American inter- 
ests on the island those at Nipe Bay lead. Five colossal com- 
panies are interested there in sugar and banana plantations, 
citrus orchards, iron mines, and the Cuba Railway, with its 
model town, Antilla. 

Promoters of the railroad did not interest themselves in it 
alone. Their land holdings are enormous. When they pro- 
jected their railway through a wild and undeveloped country 
they were able to buy land at forty to fifty cents an acre. 
Graduallv they are clearing it and converting it into some of 
the finest cane-producing land on the island, worth hundreds 
of dollars an acre. Even were they to carry freight for none 
but themselves the road would be a good investment. 

In the neighborhood of Antilla there is no land for sale to 
the small investor. The large corporations hold all that there 
is of value. Only recently a big fruit company paid $3,000,- 
000 for the 50,000-acre estate of Saetia. The company's main 
Nipe Bay settlement is at Preston, wdiere the sugar mill is 
located. It produces over 70.000 tons of sugar a year. On 
the plantation 5,000 people are employed. Everything is done 
on a large scale. The water is brought eighteen miles, from 
the mountains, at a cost of $400,000. The company store does 
a business of $(Soo,ooo a year. On the seventy miles of the 
company's standard-gauge railway are twelve locomotives and 
400 cars. 

60 



CUBA 



6i 



Throughout Cuba, the large estates have their own raih"oad 
systems for transporting produets. Long trains eonvey sugar 
cane to the mills. During the active season there is indeed a 
race, each mill attempting to heat its record or the record of its 
neighbor. All summer long they prepare, putting the mills in 
condition and installing the latest patents. Finally, in Novem- 
ber, a manager, finding the hour ripe, gives the signal and the 
mills move. From end to end of the island the news is flashed. 
Other estates start their mills and sugar ])lants throb dav and 




SCENE ON NIPE BAY, CUBA. 



62 



CUBA 




SPANISH-AMERICAN IRON COMPANY WORKS, FELTON, NIPE BAY, CUEA 




ONE OF THE MANY PKTL'KESyUE MOUNTAIN ROADS IN CUBA. 



CUBA 63 

night until May or June. Bets are made on the output, which 
is important, for the quantity of Cuha's crop influences cunch- 
lions around the world. The managers of lliese estates are 
not captains of industry ; they are generals, commanding thou- 
sands of men. 

Eastern C'uha is rich in minerals. Its ores of iron are at 
present the most exploited. They are of high grade, easily 
mined and shipped. Though known for almost four hundred 
years, they have heen commercially mined but thirty. Millions 
are rei)resented in the investments of two American companies 
whose plants are as up to date as any in the world. The ores 
are quarried rather than mined and are shipped to the United 
States for smelting. 

Near Preston is the iron mine town of Felton. \\dien the 
ore comes from the mine it has 37 per cent of water. Bv a 
process of roasting this is removed, for obviously it would be 
extravagant to pay freight to Sparrow's Point, Maryland, or 
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, on iron ore, one-third of wdiich 
consisted of water. The mine is owned by the same company 
that owns Daiquiri, where the ore is a rock formation. Here it 
covers the ground like a blanket and is scooped up with big 
steam shovels. At the present rate of consumption it will 
take six or seven hundred years to exhaust it. In order to get 
ore down from the mountains at Woodford, the longest incline 
of the kind in the world was built. It is 7,600 feet l<~>ng, with 
a lift of 1,120 feet. 

In the Nipe Bay district and elsewhere there is ample proof 
of the success of the big companies in Cuba. The success of 
the colonies and the individual colonists is, as I have intimated 
before, largely a matter of good judgment and good manage- 
ment. The quality that spells success in Cuba includes wdsdom 
in purchasing good land and not taking worthless ground. It 
has been asserted that Cuba is not a country for the American 
without money, that it is worse in this respect than Porto Rico. 
The American farmer will not suffer, however, if he avoids 
land sharks and before investing learns a little about the coun- 
try he is to settle in. Idiere is good opportunity to raise food- 



64 



CUBA 




MINING IRON AT THE MAYARI MINES, CUBA. 



stufifs for the Cuban markets. Now Cuba imports. I have 
told how the Yankee has proved himself a good colonist on the 
Isle of Pines. There, and in other districts as well, good 
judgment has brought success. 

Cuba has been a rich field for the sharpers. Their victims 
have been of two kinds — those who came to Cuba and settled, 
and those who remained at home and sent money for the 
"development" of their land. The field, in which the unscru- 
pulous real-estate dealer sowed the seed of discontent with 
existing conditions, was those Northern States in which snow 
covers the ground three or four months of the year. The 
advertising literature called attention to the hard winters, then 
made the contrast. Cuba was described as a land of perpetual 
sunshine, flowing with milk and honey twelve months of the 
year. Many of those who came to the island were ignorant 
of the language, ignorant of the laws, among a people they 
did not understand. 



CUBA 65 

What the crooked real-cslale dealer did, whenever possible, 
was to show the settler a line piece of land and deliver a deed 
for another tract that was i)ractically worthless. 'Jdie buyer 
had only himself to blame, in the majority of instances, for 
having- failed to have the sale verified by a reliable bank. The 
most unproductive land is known as savannah land, and many 
a homesick American is tryino^ to live on savannah land which 
careful investigation would have shown was not worth the 
labor put ui)on it. 

The usual method was to sell land in colonies. Some of 
these colonies, after years of hardship, are bet^innin_c^ to 
prosj^er. Good management has altered their view of the 
future. After four or five years of work a colony at Omaja, 
a hundred miles east of Santiago, is just "getting on its feet." 
The settlers do not possess deeds to their lands, owing to a 
peculiar Cuban law which tripped up the promoter of the colony. 
The money they paid is still held in escrow by a bank. F. L. 
Pfeuffer, resident manager, told me that there are about 12,000 
acres in the property controlled by this company, though much 
of it is not under cultivation. A colonist usually takes from 
ten to twenty-five acres. At one time there were 350 colonists 
at Omaja but many grew discouraged over the failure to get 
title to their land and moved away. Now there are al)out 150. 
Mr. Pfeufifer believes that a practical man with a trade could 
earn enough to keep going while developing his property. 
From his experience a man with $1,000 could get a good start, 
but he must locate where there are other Americans. 

The colonists at Omaja are of the hardy pioneer type that 
made the winning of our West a trium])h of civilization. I 
attended a good roads meeting and was much impressed with 
their earnestness of purpose. How fortune can be wooed and 
won in Cuba is demonstrated by F. C. Pierson, a nurseryman 
of New York State, who moved to Omaja when his health 
became impaired. He has one of the largest nurseries in 
Cuba, with fifty-five acres in stock. 

Cuba has 60,711 farms, with an average of 143 acres to the 
farm, yet only ten per cent of this is under cultivation. For 



CUBA 



67 



this condition there is a reason, one that accounts in no small 
part for the slowness of Cuba's development. Land unsur- 
veyed, in a wild state, is not subject to taxation. Uc'd\ proj^jcrty 
has no tax on it, either in town or country, unless it has rental 
value. In the country this amounts to four per cent and in 
urban communities it is double. Consequently, a great land- 
lord can keep tliousands of acres unsurveyed and untilled, 
without any burden being placed on him by the State. This 
practically puts a premium upon the neglect of agriculture and 
this state of affairs is what has made it hard for the American 
colonist. There is no wonder that the Cuban peasant is not 
provident. The moment that he owns a house that is better 
than a dog kennel, and begins to take thought of the morrow 
by putting in a crop that will do more than keep him alive, 
along comes the tax collector. General Menocal, who became 
President of Cuba on May i, 1913, promised to change the 
existing tax conditions. ( )ne cannot be sure of promises made 
in Cuban politics, but friends of good government in Cuba 
predict a remarkable advance during his administration, since 
he seems, in most matters, to have the American viewpoint. 
A point of interest to Americans is our naval station at 




jCi::.NE UN CUAM'AMAMO BAV^ CLIJA. 



68 CUBA 

Giiantanamo Bay, reserved perpetually for the United States 
at the close of the Spanish- American War. We have done 
little toward the fortification of our great Cuban base, but at 
present active work is under way, as Guantanamo is to protect 
the eastern entrance of the Panama Canal, just as the Pearl 
Harbor fortifications in Hawaii guard the western outpost. 
General Wood, chief of the army statT. was on the ground at 
the time of my last visit. He had with him ten picked advisers 
to inspect plans for the land defenses of this Caribbean Gibral- 
tar. There is to be a mammoth dry dock. Huge oil tanks 
are being erected. Lieutenant Winfield Liggett, Jr., our execu- 
tive officer, told me that life at the naval base was deadly dull 
except when the Atlantic fleet assembles there for target prac- 
tice. Marines from the United States are stationed at Fisher- 
man's Point, at the entrance to the bay. Back of their barracks 
rises McCalla Hill, where American blood was shed when our 
first troops were debarked, June lo. 1898. 

We have traded our other site, at Bahia Honda, on the north 
coast, for additional land at Guantanamo. As we plan to 
maintain a large garrison, it was found necessary to secure 
more drinking water, hence the "swap," of north coast land, 
which we had never utilized, for country containing hills and 
streams back of Guantanamo. An American colony is s])ring- 
ing up here, with sugar estates and lumber enterprises, within 
easy call of our bluejackets in case of trouble. 

It was officially estimated a few years ago that there were 
over 10,000,000 acres of virginal forest on the island in spite 
of the "Woodman-Spare-the-Tree" poem not having been trans- 
lated into Spanish. The valuable woods include mahogany, 
cedar, ebony and oak. Where transportation facilities have 
permitted the removal of logs, hardwoods are now scarce, but 
inland, in the central and eastern provinces recently opened up, 
there is much good timber left. Successful timber cutting and 
sawing are of course for the s])ecialist who has had experience 
in "making sawdust." It has been proved an unsafe industry 
for the uninitiated. 

If you will look at a ma|) of Cuba, you will find the town 



CUBA 69 

of Baracoa iiear the extreme eastern poiiU. Tliis is the oldest 
Spanisli setlleinent on the island, the first capital. I landed 
here from a steamer and climhed to the fort on the hill where 
they say C'oluni])Us stood in ( )ctol)er. 1492. "It is so heautiful 
that one never wearies to see it," he wrote, and thouijht he 
had reached a great empire of the Far East instead of a little 
Western isle. 

The coconut and hanana grow abundantly in this region, 
the latter always very stiff, as though it disapproves of its 
graceful neighbor, pjaracoa is the chief coconut \)Ovt of the 
island, but the production has fallen off alarmingly owing to 
a disease which has ravaged the trees. Under normal condi- 
tions the coconut yields four or five years after ])lanting, 
bears about seventy nuts a year and is a paying investment. 
Cuba is too far north to produce the best bananas for commer- 
cial use, but they are grown all over the island for home con- 
sumption. 

We bu\- nuich UKjre from the Cubans than they do from us, 
although three-fourths of their total trade is with the United 
States. Here is a chance for our hustling commercial travelers 
to unload their wares. But they had better peruse a treatise 
on diplomacy as they speed down the Over-Seas Railway. 
How strange that "Juan" and "Arturo" prefer any day to 
buy from the Sj^aniard who tyrannized them rather than from 
the "Wankce who helped to make them free! 

H it is his first trip to Cuba, the traveler must not be sur- 
prised to find negroes all over the island who say, "Si, scilor." 
instead of "Yassir," very dift'erent sort of colored men from 
the type he knows at home. 

The fortune teller, in exaiuining the palm of Cuba's suc- 
cessful ])olitical party, has predicted the meeting with a "dark 
person," whose "color scheme" promises a great source of 
worrv. The blacks in Cuba claim that they have not been 
given their share of the public offices and can probably make 
good their claim. A special law prevents their organization 
into a separate party, and not so very long ago there was an 
uprising in eastern Cuba. ])Ut down with heavy loss of life. 





< 

d 

H 
< 

O 
O 
< 

W 
o 

H 

W 
U 

< 

H 
W 



Poor C'uha lias a race proljlmi nii licr hands alinosi cfrlain lo 
i^row \vt)rse if the prescnl proportional increase in llie hlack 
race is sustained. 

Steamers of the l^^rench line connect Santia.^o de C'uha with 
Santo Domingo. Aly most \i\id remembrance of things 
Cuban is that sail down the harbor in the late afternoon, the 
rainbow city, the verdant coconut-fringed shore, the narrow, 
fort-guarded entrance. 

Idle cry, "Hobson sank the Mcrriinac just there!" brouglit 
all of us to the rail. I could ])icture that memorable night 
when the valiant Americans risked their lives in an attempt to 
corral the Spanish fleet. Though, at the point wdiere they 
sank the Mcrriinac the channel was of such a width that the 
Spanish fleet could sail by and really was not "bottled up," the 
act itself was a brave one. 

The INIorro of Santiago de Cuba overlooking sea and bay 
is one of the grandest old fortresses I have ever seen. Its 
coloring of blufl:' and rose overlaced wdth verdure, the time- 
worn steps leading up the precipitous cliff, every detail one of 
beauty and harmony. Beyond are the modern barracks. The 
sunset gun ! The Cuban flag floating out on the breeze, wdiere 
the colors of Spain long waved, wdiere the Stars and Stripes 
once were unfurled, where possibly they may again be mi- 
furled. Good-by sunny island, beautiful Cuba! 



THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 

Area, 18,04^ square miles, about the si:;e of New Hampsliire 
and J^crmont combined — Population, n)i-i, about 600,000, 
made up mainly of Creoles, Europeans mixed zvith African 
and Indian blood, and some Turks and Syrians — Chief re- 
sources, sugar, cacao, tobacco, cotton, coffee, timber — 
Imports, 1(^1 J, $0.012,641 ; exports, $io,iyj,8oo; imports 
from United States, $'i,8o2,'/6/ ; exports to United States, 
$5,443,933 — Military, authorized by law, go6 officers and 
men — Na%y\ i gunboat and 4 revoiue cutters — Raihvay, 
public, ijo miles: private lines on large estates, 250 miles; 
telegraph lines, 352 miles — Capital, Santo Domingo, popu- 
lation, 22.000 — President, 1014, General Jose Bordas. 

CHAPTER I. 

A FOSTER-CHILD. 

NOT one man out of fifty in the United States can readily 
locate the Dominican Republic, which is a sort of foster- 
child of Uncle, Sam. It covers two-thirds of the island of 
Haiti and is next door to the Black Republic. The "black and 
tan" Dominican Republic has a Spanish-speaking population 
and its metropolis, Santo Domingo City, is grandmother of the 
Americas. 

Santo Domingo, with its 22,000 inhabitants, lies on the 
south coast where the ( )zama River meets the sea. If the 
people had long-distance glasses, they could keep tab on the 
Venezuelans, for there is a clean sweep of sea between. 

We came here from Cuba on a French steamer which an- 
chored off the mouth of the Ozama. From the ship, old 
Santo Domingo looked well preserved. "She'd pass for forty," 
said a fellow passenger, "and she's over four hundred!" 

On rowing up the river to the custom's pier we recognized 
a true son of the buccaneers in our boatman. He charged 
each of us four dollars gold for two hundred yards! One 
man loudly protested, Init had to pay. 

72 



77//:" DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 



7?^ 




WATERFRONT ON THE OZAMA RIVER AT SANTO DOMINGO CITY. 



'■\\'ell," he added, "these people are properly named. I'll 
spell it 'DOUGHniinicans' after this ! And it's been the cause 
of all their trouble, too!" 

The Dominicans do hold all records for the scandalous 
handlin*^ of public funds. Soon after they broke away from 
Spain they started on this mad career, borrowing right and 
left, until they had piled up a mountain of debt, over $30,000,- 
000 and nothing to show for it ! This forty years" spree was 
filled, "acrobatically speaking," with all sorts of daring exhibi- 
tions of financial tumbling. Government paper dropping as low 
as sixty per cent discount. From the "hard up" stage they 
slipped down into the "dead broke" class. Then the foreign 
creditors demanded their money. Their sheriffs were war- 
ships. Then the Dominicans appealed to the United States 
for aid and protection and L'ncle Sam threw out a life pre- 
server. This was back in 1905. 



74 



THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 



First he looked over the list of debts and decided that fifty 
cents on the dollar would give every one back all the real 
money invested. Then he loaned this bankrupt republic $20,- 
000,000, using $15,000,000 for the creditors and the remaining 
$5,000,000 for public improvements. He appointed an able 
American as receiver of customs with assistants at all ocean 
ports and Haitian frontier posts and applied fifty-five per 
cent of the revenue toward paying back the $20,000,000 loan, 
allowing the Dominicans forty-five per cent for spending 
money. This proved a sort of "magic wand act," for, lo and 
behold ! the forty-five per cent gave the people more actual 
money than the whole hundred per cent under the old regime. 
With the change of administration in the United States, a year 
and a half ago, the trained American customs officials were 
displaced by inexperienced men and the Dominican machine 
slowed down. 

As there is no property tax in the country, the customs 




THE ANCIENT CEIIJA TREE TO WIllClI THE FIRST SPANISH CARAN ELS WERE 
MOORED. STANDS NEAR THE WATERFRONT, SANTO DOMINGO CITY. 



run noMixicAX ri-pciujc 



75 



duties are necessarily liiji^li and the recei\er lias imu-li dirficully 
in keeping the ports "'snuiggler proof." lie has live little coast- 
guard \'essels, sea-going gasoline launches, to watch all sus- 
picious-looking craft. .\t least he can watch them in moder- 
ately fair weather. "When billows dash," the toy tin fleet is 
forced to run to cover. 

As we drcive away from the customhouse, we passed the 
giant cciba tree to which a brother of Columbus moored his 
caravel ; then through an opening in an ancient wall to typical 
S[)anish- American streets and on to the Hotel Francia. Here 




i:^63*^ 



PRESIDENTS MANSION, SANTO DOMFNGO CITY. 



one pays $2.50 for rooiu and meals, the room opening on tbe 
veranda, no windows, no running water. 

Santo Domingo is not making a bid, as yet, for tourist trade, 
although it has more of interest to otfer than any other W^est 
Indian city. Xo city in the New World, in fact, can boast 
its array of historical landmarks, l-'ounded in 14Q6 by order 
of Columbus, when his earlier settlemciU on the north coast was 
abandoned, .Santo Domingo stands today the oldest Christian 
city of the Western Hemisphere. The Great Admiral himself 
knew it ; his brother and his son both ruled it as Governors ; 



76 



THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 



Cortez, Pizarro, Balboa and lesser coiiqiiistadorcs all clanked 
its narrow streets. 

( )ur first pilgrimage was to the ancient cathedral, a beauti- 
ful, mellow old church, iitting home for the tomb of Christopher 
Columbus. The solemnity of the occasion, however, was 
somewhat marred by the running comment of an American 
who insisted on going with us. We had pictured a simple 
medieval tomb, matching the dignified surroundings. Instead 




THE CATHEDRAL, SANTO DO.MIXGO CITY. BEGUN IN I514 AND 
COMPLETED IN I54O. CONTAINS THE TOMB OF COLUMBUS. 



77//: DOMINICAN RIIPUBLIC 



77 




THE COLUMBUS MAUSOLEUM IN THE CATHEDRAL. 



we beheld a gigantic ornate structure of dazzling white marble, 
blocking the aisle and towering to the ceiling. 

"Looks just like a big soda-water fountain!" remarked the 
irreverent American. "Poor old Christy! His ashes are in 
that bronze casket, that is, the most of 'em. Eight or nine 



78 THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 

different pinches are scattered all over the world, from New 
York to Italy.'' 

We remarked that the great discoverer was the i)roud pos- 
sessor of two tombs, for there is one in Seville, Spain, bearing 
his name, and no Spaniard will acknowledge that it really holds 
the remains of Diego, son of Christopher. 

When the Si)aniards gave up Santo Domingo to the French 
in the eighteenth century, they carried away to Cuba what 
they believed to be the remains of their hero. Later the same 
body was removed to Spain. About one hundred years after 
this, a Dominican priest, in repairing the Santo Domingo 
cathedral, discovered the true remains and so. by happy chance, 
Columbus lies today in the New World which he discovered. 

(In the roof of the cathedral is the mark of a cannon ball 
left by that sociable old chap. Sir Francis Drake, who sacked 
the town in 1586. From that day Santo Domingo's glory 
waned. Like many an old grandmother she dropped into the 
background, otitshone by her daughters, Cuba, Mexico and 
Peru, and by her many brilliant granddatighters. 

However, very recently the city has begun to improve. 
The streets have been paved, sidewalks laid ; there are tele- 
l)hones. electric lights, and, shades of Columbus! there are 
automobiles ! Idiere is a fine boulevard facing the sea beyond 
the city walls and the homes here would grace any land. The 
American legation is among them. On a rise overlooking the 
city is the new palatial customs office and home of the Ameri- 
can employes. They told me it is never excessively warm, 
that there is always a breeze blowing off' the Caribbean. An 
automobile-omnibus makes regular trips out this seashore road 
and on to the village of San Cristobal. 

Outside the capital and its environs most of the roads in the 
country are exceedingly bad, mere mule trails. Communication 
between the chief towns of the republic is via steamer rather 
than overland. 

As in almost every land, the types in this country differ 
widely. There are white Dominicans, cultured and traveled; 
there are coal-ljlack Dominicans (|uite uneducated. Yet every 



8o 



THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 




AMERICAN LEGATION BUILDING AT SANTO DOiMIXGO CITV, 



man, woman and child in the land has the courtesy of the 
Latin. 

Chancing into a humble little shop one day, the mulatto 
merchant made the visit of the gringos an event. He olYered 
each a glass of water. Would the sciiors like to see the 
ruins of the very old church just back of the shop? Did the 
seuors desire any information regarding the city? We left our 
address for the delivery of our purchases and were ceremon- 
iously bowed out. Next day we had altogether forgotten the 
incident, when a card was sent up. Down we went, expecting 
to meet some Government official, but, to our amazement, there 
stood the little merchant, silk hat in hand, accompanied by his 
three small sons all dressed in white, the eldest bringing a gift 
to the foreign scilors. We were amazed, but also touched. It 
would not happen in Chicago. There one is not "touched" just 
in the same way. 

And, speaking of losing your money. When the Domini- 
cans were outfitting for a new national life under United 
States management, they set their hearts on possessing a wire- 
less station. Finally Uncle Sam consented and they spent 
$40,000 on what was catalogued as an "A i — High Power Set. 



Tiir. noMixicAN Ni-rrHLic 



8i 



Warranted to Talk Like a l^irrot!" I'^roni New \'()rk came 
this last word in wonders and proudly the mast towered sky- 
ward on the seashore, 1)\" the old hattered wall of the first city 
of the Americas. Then the gunhoat Prcsidriite went out to 
sea with its wireless for the great test. The day came. The 
day went. The thing did not work. 

They kei)t on trying it dailv for about a year and decided 
to use a megaphone. They did send one message, however, to 
New ^"ork. Tt arrived in the form of a letter reading : "Come 
and take hack \-our old outfit. It's deaf and dumb." 

We understand that the company in the United States 
claimed that the frequent revolutions in Santo Domingo were so 
"shocking" as to neutralize the electric power of the station. 
At all events, they refused the money. The Dominicans were 
planning to use the wireless mast as a $40,000 flag pole, but a 
bright one among them, after much tinkering, discovered the 
"missing link" and now the plant is reported as being in 
commission. 

Anions the most beautiful of Santo Doming^o's monuments 



1 





IWKr OF SFAFROXT, S.VNTO DOMINGO CITV. MONUMENT TO LIVES LO.ST 
HERE IN WHAT IS CALLED "THE MOUTH OF HELL." 



82 



THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 



is that which stands at the point known as "The Mouth of 
Hell," honoring the memory of Dominicans who lost their lives 
near this point, where the waves dash. 

One of the picturcs(|ue sights in Santo Domingo is the 
ferry across the Ozania River. Bridges throughout the coun- 
try are few. Laden ponies and burros ; clumsy oxen, yoked 
by the horns ; boys on horseback using straw saddles ; women 
on foot carrying baskets on their heads; even well-dressed 
cavaliers — all wait at the river shore for the primitive ferry, 

upon which they crowd with great 
eagerness. The country folk, with 
their wares, are bound for the 
marketplace. undoubtedly the 
most "colorful" spot in town, 
where beasts of burden form a 
)atient line, relieved finally of the 
ill-fitting straw saddles and huge 
panniers woven from banana and 
l)lantain fiber. 

Delicacies on sale in the market 
are candied cashew nuts, and the 
tender heart of the Royal palm 
eaten as a salad. Tee cream made 




FORTRESS OF TTOMEN.W, THE OLDEST FORTRESS IN THE NEW 
WORLD, SANTO DOMINGO CITY. 



TUR DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 



«^3 



from the milk of fresh coconuts is another dish for the gods. 
We met an American commercial traveler at the hotel who 
told us he had been coming to Santo Domingo for many years 
and had watched "the political game" with interest. He 
thought the country would eventually heed the message regard- 
ing progress, with Porto Rico making a wonderful display on 
one side and Cuba trying to make a record for self-control on 
the other. 

"There's nothing wrong with the Dominican constitution," 
he said. "It's a hne, husky constitution, breathing liberty and 
the joy of living in every line. But somehow it doesn't prevent 
these politicians from jailing the leading citizens on all sorts 
of trumped-up charges and keeping them in jail at royal pleas- 
ure. The petty rulers in each district — Jefes, they're called — 
have found a reliable source of income in "grafting by draft- 
ing,' serving sons of well-to-do people with notices to report 
for military service. Then the fond parents disgorge a piece 
or two of money and the near-recruit is pronounced physically 
unfit. All the corruption is charged up to the party in power, 
so the best element is nearly always against the Government." 
Away back in 1884. a negro, named Heureaux. nicknamed 
"Lelis," elected himself to the Presidency and held the j(jb for 
fifteen years. Many are the 
stories they tell of his depravity 
and cruelty, how he slaughtered 
all who opposed his wishes and 
turned over concessions, monopo- 
lies, even the customhouse, on re- 
ceipt of "cash payments." This 
reign of terror was brought to a 
close by a well-placed bullet from 
the pistol of Caceres, whose father 
he had murdered. Later on. 
Caceres himself became President, 
to meet the same fate at the hand 
of an assassin. 

We agreed with our inf()rmant 
that it seemed to be extra hazard- 




A MILKMAN, SANTO DOMINGO CITY, 



84 



THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 




GATEWAY IN THE OLD CITY WALE. 




SCENE IN EKUNT OF TliE MARKET. 



77//: noMINIC.lN RIIPUBLIC 85 

ous business, l)ul tliouglit tliere were still many illustrious 
sons training for the position, if chicanery was an indication. 
Two years ago a revolution was put down with considerable 
(lifliculty. Uncle Sam exhibited two warships and 700 
marines, but succeeded in patching things up only by calling the 
archbishop to the Presidency. This is the second time in the 
country's history that warring factions have had their death 
grip broken by the advent of the holy cross. While this truce 
stopped bloodshed for the time being, the "national sport" 
again took the field and "the double cross" was employed 
instead of the cross of the Church. Ever since we left the 
country a revolution has been in full swing. Word arrives that 
railroad traffic is suspended and ports blockaded. 1'he cacao 
crop is molding in the interior. Business throughout the 
Repul)lic is stagnant. A serious crisis is at hand. 

In the famous revolution of 1904. Uncle Sam acted as 
umpire. Commander Dillingham of the gunboat Detroit, on 
learning that the revolutionists were about to "shoot up" a 
Dominican town, suggested that the defenders go out in the 
open and fight the invaders like sports. The proposition was 
accepted. Lines were marked ofif by flags. The Government 
forces were placed on one side, the rebels on the other and 
told to fight to their hearts' content. The only rule laid down 
was that retreat beyond the prescribed lines must be accepted 
as defeat, the losers to surrender. When all was arranged, 
foreign consuls and clubmen hired carriages and went out to 
see the battle. A valiant struggle followed, a retreat ; a rally ; 
"five yards to gain ;" a second retreat by the rebels ; then — 
surrender ! The unique war match was over — for that day, 
at least. 



CHAPTER II. 
ACROSS THE REPUBLIC. 

1 1 T SAY, my good man, is this boat going up or down," 

X asked an anxious old lady of a deck hand. 

"Waal, ma'am," he replied, "she's a leaky old tub, so I 
shouldn't wonder if she was goin' down ; but thin, ag'in, her 
b'ilers ain't none too good, so she might be goin' up !" 

This story came to mind upon boarding the rickety little 
coasting vessel which takes one over to Macoris, the new, rich, 
flourishing sugar port, forty miles east of Santo Domingo. 
Sugar, cacao and tobacco are the three leading industries of 
the Dominican Republic. It ranks seventh among the sugar- 
producing countries of the world. 

"We have fine sugar soil," was the claim in San Pedro de 
Macoris. "You see, we don't have to irrigate as they do over 
in Azua, where they must sink artesian wells. We just clear 
the forest, make a hole in the ground, stick in a joint of cane 
as you would an eye of a potato, and we have ten crops with- 
out re])lanting."' 




i I i 



SAN PEDRO DE MARCORIS, THE GREAT SUGAR PORT, SOUTH COAST. 

86 



THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 



87 



*ir^ 









\ 



BRINGING IN THE SUGAR CANE. 

After the ex[)ort tax on sugar was abolished, there was a 
boom in the island, over $5,000,000 worth of sugar having l)een 
shipped in 19 12. A drought followed and sugar figures 
dropped, but the 1914 crop, estimated at 125,000 tons, promises 
to beat the record. The most of the companies are American, 
at least they are registered as American companies. 

"Does the sugar go to the United States?" was asked. 

"Yes, it goes there, but it doesn't stop. It is transshipped 
at New York for Canada and England." 

We learned that there are twelve big estates, and that a new 
sugar district is being opened up at La Romana, where an 
American company is clearing a tract forty miles in -length 
and building twenty-five miles of standard-gauge railwav. 
The land is cheap, eight to ten dollars an acre. 

The port of Macoris is favorably situated as a shipping 
point, as the Alacoris River admits vessels drawing twentv- 
two feet. On a tug one steams up river to the Consuelo estate, 
where an interesting lal)or |)rol)lem is found. The foreman 



88 



THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 



must have a working knowledge of several languages, as the 
field hands are imported from the British, French, Dutch and 
Danish West Indies, also from Haiti. They receive fifty to 
seventy cents for a twelve-hour day. Native labor is scarce, 
as the frequent revolutions have kept the population down to 
a comparatively small number per square mile. Many Haitians 
cross the island to work in Macoris, but black labor can now be 
imported only for the season, as a new law permits none but 
white persons as settlers. The Dominicans hope that this 




SCENE ON A .Sl'G.AR PLANTATION. 

order will eventually have a bleaching effect on the national 
complexion. 

From the south coast we sailed around to the eastern side of 
the island, to the far-famed Samana Bay. This magnificent 
harbor is really an inland sea, thirty-five nfiles in length, nine 
in width, practically landlocked, as the entrance narrows to 



THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 



89 



six-tenths of a mile between an island and the mainland. Once 
inside, there is deep-water anchorage for all the warships and 
merchant vessels that sail the high seas. 

Samana Hay controls the Mona Passage, which is in a 
direct line between Enrope and the Panama Canal. It came 
within an ace of belonging to the United States during Presi- 
dent Grant's administration. A Dominican President made 
the proposition and we sent commissioners down there to study 
the question. They returned wnth a treaty of annexation 
which our Senate rejected by a tie vote. Our naval strategists 

have never got- 
ten over it and. 
even at this late 
day, are s u g- 
gesting that we 
make an effort 
to acquire at 
least the penin- 
sula with its 
command of ad- 
jacent waters. 




HOMES ON S.V.MAXA BAY, UO.MINICAN KEl'LBLIC. 



90 THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 

It was on the northern shore of this bay that the first 
European blood was shed in the New World. A party sent 
on shore by Columbus was attacked by Indians and several of 
the sailors were mortally wounded by arrows. That, of covirse, 
was before the conquest by Spain. At the time of the con- 
quest there were estimated to be one million aborigines on the 
island, but so terrible was the treatment accorded them that 
fifty years later the race was virtually exterminated. Their 
blood flows today in the veins of many a Dominican, mixed 
with that of the Spanish conquerors and the American slaves. 
With the loss of the Indians as laborers on plantations and in 
mines, the Spaniards, as in Porto Rico, found it necessary to 
import great numbers of negro slaves, beginning early in the 
sixteenth century. 

Ten miles up the bay is the charming littl-e town of Samana, 
built in a coconut grove at the foot of the verdure-clad hills. 
This is the loveliest spot in the Republic. As one looks down 
from the heights back of the town on palm-clad capes and 
wooded islands, on a wonderfully colored bay and encircling 
mountains, one fancies that here, under a stable Government, 
a great international winter playground may some day be 
produced. One conjures up a mammoth tourist hotel, a fleet of 
yachts in the harbor, and rows of charming villas, only to 
awake to the fact that this is Santo Domingo. Still, some 
time in the dim future the dream may come true. 

Back in 1825, Samana was the site chosen for the trans- 
planting of some of our surplus American negro population. 
Descendants of the original colony still farm in the San Juan 
Valley, a few miles inland from Samana. They are fairly 
prosperous and are by far the most diligent workers in the 
country. One of them, who spoke English, claimed that 
he was of "Yankee abstraction." He certainly had the Yankee 
hustle, for he sent out a note to the steamer captain saying: 
"Have a fine l)nll-])up for sale. Will eat anything. \"ery fond 
of children." 

"ihe Dominican Re])ub1ic, like Cuba, is free from venomous 
re])tiles and savage animals, so we sui)pose the people can ])ut up 



nil- nOMlSlCAN RliPUBLlC 



91 




CUKJNG CACAO IX THE DOMINICAN KErilil-TC. 



witli the insects. They have a fine assortment of those. We 
met a number of varieties every time we walked on the grass, 
and the people of the upper classes are sure to invite the 
stranger to a picnic. The people love outdoor life. We saw 
big tarantulas ambling over walls, but the natives did not 
seem to fear these horrible spiders, and several assured us that 
the bite is not so dangerous as commonlx- supposed. 

At the head of Samana Bay is the village of Sanchez with 
900 inhabitants, owing its commercial existence to the fact that 
it is the terminus of the seventy-mile Scotch I\ailwa\' up into 
the Cibao. 

You hear of the Cibao more often than of an\ thing else in 
the Republic, but we had difficulty in locating it. We finally 
decided that the term applies to the country between the cen- 
tral and northern ranges of mountains, including the great 
valley of the \'ega. Here are the most fertile lands, the 
richest cacao plantations in the country. 

The crop of chocolate beans in 19 12 was \alucd at nearly 
$3,000,000 and furnished the bulk of the freight for the Scotch 



92 



THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 




LONG-HORNED CATTLE ON A PLANTATION. 




ROYAL PALMS OF THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC. 



THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 



93 



Railway. The Goveninient cut the export tax on cacao in half 
to promote production and the returns ha\e been encouraging, 
although the planters are still wailing over the terrible blight 
which attacked the tree a few years ago. They admit, however, 
that the recent advance in price has eased the situation. The 
1913 crop fell off slightly, owing to political disturbances, 
drought and damages by insect pests. This product, however, 
yielded forty per cent of the export values of the year. 

We made the journey overland from Sanchez to Puerto 
Plata on the south shore. There is but a short break in rail 
connection between the Samana Railroad, through the Vega, 
and the Government line, running inland from Puerto Plata to 
the important city of Santiago. 

Near Samana Bay, the railway skirts mangrove swam])s, 
the home of the snowy egret and the scarlet ibis. Then we 
climbed U]) to rolling pasture lands, through dense groves of 
cacao. Alile on mile of Royal palms flank the track. As 
trains here seldom exceed a fifteen-mile-an-hour speed (express 
trains sometimes make twenty miles) and stop from tive to 
fifteen minutes at every village, there was ample time to 
observe the surroundings. 



* 





'n' 



#^f'' 



'*:Af 



> VI 



* I 



i 



SADDLE BULLS USED IN THE FOOTHILLS AND \AL1,E\S Ol' ( II'.AO 
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC. 



94 THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 

Beyond Almacen the country becomes more open. There 
are herds of cattle accompanied by flocks of white birds, which 
perch on the backs of the animals, freeing them from insects. 
Many of the cattle are of a slender breed peculiar to this island 
and occasionally used as saddle animals. They are sure-footed 
but not capable of much speed. 

Five hours out from Sanchez we pulled into La Vega, 
terminus of the line, having climbed only 300 feet above sea 
level. La ^'ega is a rambling town of 5,000 people with little 
of interest beyond its sawmills, which tell of forest wealth 
close at hand. Just in sight tower the mountains of the central 
range, covered from base to summit with forests of yellow 
pine. 

While eighty-five per cent of the land area of the Republic 
is covered with timber, lack of transportation has handicapped 
the development of the lumbering industry. A belt twenty- 
five miles wide, bordering the coast and railways, embraces all 
the cut-over area. The fine quality of Santo Domingo hard- 
woods has long been noted, the mahogany especially being 
famous for its great size and beauty when polished. There is 
also a quantity of greenheart, the wood which the United 
States Department of Agriculture claims will outlast steel or 
iron when placed in water. This wood was specified for the 
sills and fenders in the lock gates of the Panama Canal. Nan- 
sen's and Amundsen's sturdy ship, the FraJii, was also built of 
it. While British Guiana is cutting her crop of greenheart, the 
Dominican Republic is carrying hers in stock. 

The wretched roads are responsible for the importation of 
shiploads of American pine for building purposes, but the 
virtually untouched timber resources will be developed, as an 
Ohio firm has purchased 500,000,000 feet of mahogany and a 
Baltimore company the same amount of yellow pine. Logging 
roads are to be built and fertile clearings opened up for general 
agriculture. 



CHAPTER III. 

THE MECCA OF MECCAS. 

WE WERE glad to get away from the squalid little inn 
in La \'ega, but as we rode out on the muddy trail to 
-Moca we doubted that we had bettered ourselves. We had 
never seen mud quite so sloppy or so deep, but our valiant 
mules somehow kept above ground. There was no other way 
to connect with the Santiago-Puerto Plata Railway, but one 
compensation la}- cii route — the view of the Vega Real from 
the heights of Cerro Santo, the Sacred Mountain. Here 
Columbus stood when he first beheld the great valley. One 
hundred miles it stretches from this mountain to Samana Bay. 
Now towns, roads and the railway lay below us on the plain 
with the same sea of palms which waved a welcome to the 
Great Admiral. La \'ega Real, he christened it, "The Royal 
Meadows," and all agree with him that there is none on earth 
more beautiful. 

The break between the two railroads of the Cibao looks but 
a step from the Cerro Santo. We were told in La \ ega that 
this missing link is due to the exorbitant j^rice put on certain 
cacao and c(»11"ee lands. We also heard that the ten miles of road 
between La A ega and Moca is vastly superior to the average 
Dominican highway. If this is true, aeroplanes had better 
start up business. Tiie road has such an unpleasant habit of 
running back and forth across the river; or perhaps the road is 
straight and the river does the "serpentine." At any rate, we 
were thankful to reach Moca and secure train connection all 
the way to the coast. 

Moca was the home of the late Ramon Caceres, the Farmer 
President, who owned the largest cacao estate in the Cibao. 
Here he spent the greater portion of his time away from the 
cares of state. As its name implies, Moca is also known to 

95 



77//: noM/xic.ix Rl-PVniJC 



97 



local fame as a coffee center. Alllii»ii^li raised mostly for 
home consumption, $250,000 worth of cofl'ee was shipped last 
year. This was a big falling off from 1912, when over $566,000 
worth was exported. That old rascal, "Drought," was at the 
bottom of it again. 

It is a short run by rail to Santiago, more properly, Santiago 
de los Caballeros. founded l)ack in 1504 bv special permission 
from King Ferdinand of Spain as a grant to liidahjos of noble 
blood — hijos dc alyos — "sons of somebody." 'idie "de los 
Caballeros" made of Santiago "A City of Centlemen" and the 
inhabitants still insist on their full title. Here are the most 
conservative and purely "Dominican" pec^ple of the country. 

The city is an important tobacco center, the exports of leaf 
tobacco amounting to $1,000,000 annually, shipped for the 
most part to Hamburg. This to1)acco sells for about $5 per 
hundred itounds. Some very good cigars are made in the 
country. The dried leaves of the Royal palm, called guana, are 
used as a protection for the tobacco as it comes into town from 
the country, packed in huge panniers swung on the backs of 
horses and burros. 

In Santiago we ate our first cakes made from banana flour. 
The delicious flavor of the fruit is retained wdien dried and 
pulverized. There is surely a future ahead for this industry. 




1 1 




\ i ( 



TOBACCO READY FOR .SHIPMENT. DO.MI.XTCAN REPUBLIC. 



98 THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 

With a modern evaporating plant all the "rejected for ship- 
ment" bananas can be promptly converted into "Fine Banana- 
Flake Breakfast Food — Delicious, Digestible, Desirable." 
Some enterprising Yankee ought to put it on the market. It 
should, at least, beat wooden nutmegs. 

We were interested to learn that the Dominican Republic 
is one of the few places on earth which has amber in any 
great quantity, the bulk of the world's supply being found on 
the Baltic seacoast. Amber, which is simply fossilized rosin 
derived from certain coniferous trees, is found near Santiago 
in sandstone bordering the beds of streams, but the deposits 
have not yet been studied scientifically. So this country can 
furnish not only the wood for the making of a pipe and the 
tobacco to fill it, but can finish the pipe with an amber tip 
and supi)ly matchwood on the side. 

We enjoyed the forty-two mile railroad "glide" from the 
plateau down to the sea. A rack system is used on a portion 
of the line and its operation is most expensive, four locomo- 
tives being required to elevate a loaded train. This spells 
"rack and ruin" to the receipts. A longer route has been sur- 
veyed which will eliminate the cogwheel system. An American 
improvement company built the road over twenty years ago, 
Belgium furnishing the money and the Dominicans guarantee- 
ing the interest. The improvement companv made all the 
money, as it had an earning agreement with the Government, 
and Belgium had to whistle for her interest. Finally the 
improvement company was forced to sell out to the Dominicans. 

We met an American on the train w'ho had absorbed a lot 
of specific knowledge of the country during eight years' service 
on a sugar estate. He looked promising, so we attacked him 
soon after we left Santiago with the direct question : "\Miat 
is wrong, anyway, with this country?" 

"W^ith the country?" he replied. "Nothing. It's the peo- 
ple, the country is rich enough. It could support six million 
instead of a few hundred thousand. Why, over in the Cibao 
the soil is richer than the mud of the Nile! But you saw how 
few people cultivate it. Robinson Crusoe had more inhab- 



THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 



99 



itanls on his island than they have in whole sections here. 
Trouble is, they all want to be President, even if they get shot 
for it. They certainly did need us Americans down here to 
count the cash. And, will you believe it, even with all the 
fighting going on this last year, the volume of business passed 
the record. Nature just produced the goods in spite of the 
Dominicans. Duties high? Yes, many imports are taxed 
eighty and ninety per cent and this puts a check on develop- 




SOLDIER-POLICEMEN OF THE REPUBLIC. 

ment. I can't see why Uncle Sam doesn't have them reduce 
the duties. They are paying off the $20,000,000 debt alto- 
gether too speedily. When it's all paid up, the American 
receiver will have to pack his grip and get out, and then the 
politicians will get their grip on the treasury and there will be 
a revival of the dear old business of killing each other."' 

In dealing with the Dominican Republic's affairs the United 
States authorities have a knotty problem to solve. It has 
developed that the W'ilscMi administration is not fully satis- 
fied with the policy of the last administration in virtually 
assuming a protectorate over the republic. President Wilson, 



loo THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC 

it is said, is not entirely in sympathy with tlie way in which 
Americans took control of the Dominican finances. Measures 
were taken whereby the customs revenues were apportioned so 
that certain "bad debts" were to be paid off, and it has been 
charged that some of the debts given preference were those of 
Wall Street financiers. This claim is always made. 

Puerto Plata is wonderfully situated on a peninsula, with 
cooling breezes from either side. It is the chief commercial 
port of the Republic, but not so much of a city in appearance 
as Santo Domingo or Santiago. It does not look old, nor is it 
especially interesting, although it was founded in the sixteenth 
century and has played its role in the island's history. This 
poor city has hardly missed a single revolution and, in fact, has 
been the bull's-eye in all political disturbances. The people 
have become accustomed to small rations and the smell of 
gunpowder. 

INIonte Cristi, sixty-five miles to the west, is another coast 
port, where the climate is less tropical than at Puerto Plata ; in 
fact it lies in a semi-arid belt which parallels the eastern border 
of the Republic. They are beginning to raise cotton here with 
promising results. 

Halfway between Puerto Plata and Monte Cristi is the 
Mecca of Meccas for every one of us in the New World. 
Here, hidden in a deserted thicket, on a point where the Baja- 
bonico River meets the sea, lie the ruins of the oldest Christian 
settlement in the Americas. This was Isabela, the first town 
which Columbus built. 

We hope that some day a statue may be erected here in 
honor of the Great Admiral. In bronze he should stand 
through the years by the earth-covered fort of old Isabela, 
pointing westward where "the course of empire takes its way," 
though the time has arrived when the famous phrase should 
be altered to read, "Southward the course of empire takes its 
wav," since nearlv all the best and cheapest lands in the world 
now lie south of the United States, not west. 



REPUBLIC OF HAITI 

Area, 10,204 square miles, a little larger than the State of 
Maryland — Population, 191 3, estimated at j,joo,ooo, 
majority negroes — Chief resources, tobacco, sugar, cacao, 
cotton, coffee, timber, agriculture ; hazr copper, iron and 
coal, but are little developed — Total exports, J912 [latest 
obtainable), $i/,28j,48j; imports, $9,8/6,jjj — Debt, gold, 
^$2 4, 362,699; paper currency, $15,514,812 — Army, 1013, 
about 25.000 — Nazy. 4 small zrssels — Rail-K'ay, 350 miles 
building; telegraph lines. 124 miles — Capital, Port-au- 
Prince, population, 100,000 — President, Ceneral Orestes 
Zamor. 

CHAPTER I. 

THE BLACK REPUBLIC. 

WHILE Haiti is not a United States colony and is not so 
closely connected with the American Government in a 
tinancial way as the Dominican Republic, its relation to our 
country is such that a description of it will, no doubt, be of 
much interest. 

As far as we are aware. Haiti's story has never been really 
staged in a literary sense. There is so much action that it 
would require three rings and several side shows to do it 
justice. It certainly lends itself to a black-face tragedy or a 
melodrama with blood and thunder in every scene. There 
would be enough material left over for a first-class minstrel 
shovv^ and a gorgeous costume piece. But, as a motion-picture 
film, it would hardly get by the censor. 

Since 1804. when the slaves slashed their way to freedom 
and launched a Black Republic, twenty-three rulers have 
essayed the role of "leading man" with disastrous results. 
Tliree were shot, two were poisoned, one was dynamited, one 
suicided. This accounts for seven. Eleven were driven into 
exile; two died in oftice ; only three left the presidential chair 
personally intact. Rather a poor record to hand to a life insur- 
ance agent, for instance. 

lOI 



102 



REPUBLIC OF HAITI 



r 



fflr 



m 



i*' 



k. 



STATUE OF DESSALINES, PORT-A 
PRINCE, HAITI. 



This fertile country, where the 
white man is not allowed to own 
land, is an interesting study. Its 
childlike people have been bullied, 
ridiculed, exploited and maligned 
in turn, through the years. ( )nce 
it was the richest of French posses- 
sions, the most productive bit of 
earth for its size on the globe. 
Negroes by the thousands were im- 
ported to toil on the white man's 
sugar estates. Then came the era 
of bloodshed, the battle of the 
slaves for freedom, led by the 
really noble Toussaint I.'Ouver- 
ture, the greatest man the black 
race has ever produced. Trapped 
by the French, L'Ouverture died in 
a European pri.son, and his sav- 
age general, Dessalines, led the slaves to victory. No less a 
man than Rochambeau, commanding the flower of Napoleon's 
army, lowered the colors of France. 

Born in Africa, or the offspring of savages captured in the 
jungles of the Dark Continent, the Haitians were ill-fitted for 
self-government and have been left to work out their own 
salvation. The world has not held out the helping hand. 

Our steamer arrived at Port-au-Prince at daybreak, and we 
wish we could say that the town at near view looks as well as 
it does from the sea. Terracing up the mountain side, framed 
in verdure, no Caribbean city is more beautifully situated. 
Docking at the best pier in the West Indies, we passed a well- 
built customhouse, but from there on we seemed to note only 
the things that were missing. 

It is all very well for them to remind one that $200,000 has 
just been spent on street improvements ; that there is an electric 
plant ; a new system of water works ; a cathedral costing half a 
million ; a national bank ; schools, colleges and hospitals. The 



•* 



RF.PrniJC OF JJ.IJTI 



103 



Hailians (lcscr\c credit for all tliis. lUil the traveler sees 
only the dirt and sciualor and feels that he has stra\'ed into the 
back yard by mistake. If one can stay in a villa up on the 
hills, where the aristocratic llailians live, one is all right. If 
one must stay at a hotel down in the town, where microbes fly 
merrily about in the dust of unsprinkled streets, one is all 
wrong. There are 100,000 people in the capital, blacks, mnlat- 
toes and about 500 foreigners. White is not a fashionable 
shade. The national motto is "Haiti for the Haitians." 

"(ienerals are thicker than flies down here." the steamer 
captain told us, and on the very hrst street back of the water- 
front we met a batch of officers, dazzling bevond descri])tion, 
their multi-colored um'f(n-ms heavily incrnsted with gilt. We 
followed some tattered soldiors to a public square. They did 
not seem in the least belligerent. Some s])rawled in the shade 
chewing sugar cane : others accosted us with the one scrap of 
English on the tongue of every Haitian pri\ate. "(iive me five 
cents." 

There are over 20,000 of these ragamuffins under arms and 
probably 6,000 bedecked officers. The privates receive prac- 




TYPICAL STREET SCENE IN PORT-AU-PRINCE. 



REPUBLIC or JI.IITJ 



lo.S 



tically no pay, but pick up a little cash when off duty by doing 
odd chores. We saw six of them washing- bottles in a soda- 
water factory. Much of the national vitality is lost in this 
irregular army, useless to repel invasion, always making trou- 
ble at home. As the President is usually a military chief who 
happens to get possession of the troops, bayonets have an 
important bearing on his tenure of office, and as a German 
merchant expressed it, "Here in Haiti you can do al)out any- 
thing with a bayonet excepting sit on it." 

"But why under the sun do they have so many generals?" 
we asked. 

"Well, you see it's an old custom." he said. "They were 
always afraid the French would come back and take the coun- 
try. So they decided to have a skeleton army in the back- 
ground with plenty of officers in the front row and call in the 
field hands in case of trouble. They all want to be generals. 
A general can rent soldiers out for all sorts ol work and 
keep half the money. A big politician managed to get a gen- 
eral's commission for his prospective son and heir, some years 
ago, but the child turned out to be a girl." 




■ 1»* f '- 



PORT-AU-PRINCE GONIiRN 1\I ENT BlILDINGS. 



io6 REPUBLIC OF HAITI 

We photographed a good many generals and believe that the 
camera is the most effective weapon that can be used against 
them. It always brings them to a halt and a heroic pose. 

In spite of their early hatred of the French, the Haitians 
speak the tongue of their former masters and are very fond of 
high-sounding Latin names. "Bonaparte" and "Voltaire" being 
great favorites. They draw on mythology, on the sciences, 
in fact, they will soar to any height. We met a "General Nep- 
tune" and a "General Oxygen." Perfectly good names, we 
suppose. We did not meet a "General Debility." 

A number of fairly creditable Government buildings face 
the Champ de Mars, the mam square of the capital. Here is 
the platform, with the Royal palm, typical of every Haitian 
city, called the "Altar of the Country." It seems to be a sort 
of national shrine. Ornamenting the railing of the platform 
are busts of heroes, L'( )uverture, Dessalines, ' Petion and 
others, and, what strikes the traveler as strange at first, all the 
marble faces are black. 

A tragedy in the Champ de Mars was the blowing up 
of the presidential mansion in 19 12, killing Chief Executive 
Leconte and 600 others, a very terrible affair. A new Haitian 
White House (or perhaj^s we should say say "Black House") 
is to be erected on this site. 

The Simon administration ended in ignominious flight 
across the Champ de Mars to the pier, when the President 
and his followers sought refuge on the island of Jamaica, the 
adopted home of dark gentlemen in trouble. Simon had 
planned to leave on a gunboat, but all were out of commission, 
so he boarded an American schooner. 

Haiti has had sad luck with her navy, and is at present all 
"black and blue" over her efforts to make real tars of her 
dusky landsmen. The last coft'ee bean was expended in pur- 
chasing a fleet of broken-down tugs and yachts, all of which 
apparently yearned to become submarines, some with complete 
success. 

The Conscrva, purchased on the bargain counter in Brook- 
lyn, sailed for her new home on a foggy morning. She 



io8 



REPUBLIC OF 1 1 Air I 



was a leaky tub, and after passiiiy S;m(ly Hook was never 
heard of again. So far as is known, not a soul survived. 

The old yacht Earl King was also a New York purchase, 
and under the proud title of Libcrtc, lasted a full year before 
blowing up with seventy unfortunate Haitians. 

Some speculators unloaded the antique Italian cruiser 
L'mbyia on President Simon, and a native engineer soon had 
her ready for the junk pile. The engineer's previous experi- 
ence had been on a narrow-gauge railroad. The iirst officer 
had formerly occupied the position of chef at a hotel in Port- 
au-Prince. 

The gunboat Centenairc was sent to Jamaica for repairs 
and condemned as worthless. The Seventeenth of December, 
a large yacht of American construction, got as far as Haiti on 
her maiden voyage and broke down. The gunboat Ferrier, 
formerly the $1,000,000 yacht America, after lying in pawn 
for months in the Delaware River, waiting in vain for neces- 
sary repair funds from Haiti, was at last sold to the University 




THE NEW MARKET, PORT-AU-PRINCE. 



REPUBLIC OF HAITI 109 

of Pennsylvania and sent n]) tlic Amazon on an explorin*^ 
expedition. Here it was fmally abandoned as unseaworthy. 

I'ncle Sam at last showed pity and allowed Commander 
White. cn,^"ineer ofticer of the United States Navy, a year's 
leave of absence to undertake the reorganization of the "Black 
Armada." All his Yankee ingenuity will be required to doctor 
up Haiti's ocean cripples and he certainly will be handicajjped 
if the Haitians are able to translate his name ! 

H you want to see the people of Haiti at their liveliest, take 
your smelling salts and sally forth to the marketplace. You 
will find one market well housed, where the food is shaded 
from the fierce tropic sun, and another, more popular, in an 
open square. Here the glistening white cathedral with its 
stately spires seems out of tune with the surroundings, as it 
towers above overladen donkeys, sun-spoiled products and a 
chattering, perspiring crowd of blacks. 

As we stood on the cathedral steps looking down on this 
motley array, two Haitians of the educated class passed by 
engaged in an animated discussion as to the merits of a certain 
drama just produced in Paris. One carried a well-known 
French periodical under his arm. The other, my guide in- 
formed me, was a poet of local fame. In spite of the extreme 
heat they were attired in toj) hats and frock coats, the neces- 
sary essentials for every Haitian who wishes to be taken 
seriously. 

The American legation, although situated in town instead 
of up in the pure air of the hills, is a i)retentious building. The 
new American minister, Mr. Bailey Blanchard, will probably 
have a villa on the heights, at some distance from the capital, 
where the full beauty of the island and the remarkable situation 
of Port-au-Prince can be appreciated. 

A Government proclamation issued during our visit stated 
that a loan of $1,500,000 was to be negotiated for further 
public works. The Haitian capital has been improved greatl}- 
in recent years. In time, if the revolutionists will permit the 
good work to keep on, it may live up in a half-hearted way, at 
least, to its charming einironnK'iil. 



CHAPTER II. 

people:, towns and resources. 

LIKE a pail overflowing with blackberries is Haiti, the 
Ebony Land. There are 2,500,000 inhabitants, 240 to 
the square mile, a population seven times as compact as in the 
United States. The Black Republic is an earnest contestant 
in the race of nations for density of population, led only, in the 
New World, by Porto Rico, Salvador and Barbados. Eighty 
per cent of the natives are full-blooded negroes, the remainder 
mulattoes. Whites are such a negligible quantity as to show 
hardly a trace in the analysis. The inky-hued have always 
shown aversion even to the mulattoes, and very few Haitian 
Presidents have exhibited a tinge of the deadly white on the 
pure black of their escutcheons. 

When roused by the fear of recurrent white domination, 
these happy-go-lucky children of nature revert to savagery, 
fighting to preserve for their own this one little isle of the 
earth where they are working out their dusky destiny. 

"Are Americans popular down here?" we asked an edu- 
cated Haitian who spoke English fluently. 

"Black ones might be, if they came," he answered, "but they 
seldom do. The Americans we usually see are the promoters 
who come to get Government concessions for railroads and 
municipal improvements, and this always means another 
mortgage on our coffee crop. If you want the truth, the Stars 
and Stripes were formerly much respected, but, about six 
years ago, a revolution broke out up the coast at St. Marc, and 
several of the leaders, when pursued, sought refuge in the 
American consulate. The Haitian Government cabled Wash- 
ington and Washington replied, ordering the consul to give up 
the rebels. They were taken out and shot and the bitterness 
of their sympathizers has grown with the years." 

110 



REPUBLIC OF HAITI 



III 











;.,.. '>"««: .^.. : ■ t 




AN OLD FRENCH AOfJEDUCT, HAITI. 



We found, in spite of much ill feeling against Americans 
and whites in general, that we are doing business in Haiti. The 
McDonald Syndicate has a big railroad concession ; A. M. 
Archer has but recently restored the old French irrigation sys- 
tem near Port-au-Prince for the Government and installed 
electric plants in a number of cities'; Berlin & March, an 
American rtrm. have the street-paving contract in the capital, 
and American companies are cutting and exporting hardwoods 
and developing a copper mine. 

United States firms also manage to supply the bulk of 
Haiti's needs, selling them about $6,000,000 of their average 
annual imports of about $9,000,000 per year, while Great 
Britain, France and other countries trail behind in the race for 
trade. Not one of them has got into the million-dollar class! 

Out on the country roads we noticed that most of the 
plump black uiadamcs and iiiadeiiioisellrs bringing produce 
into town were clad in blue flenim. and curiosity led us to 
inquire where the cloth came from. A (lerman merchant 
admitted with a show of feeling that it was not manufactured 



112 



REPUBLIC OF HAITI 



in Hamburg. "It is Yankee trash," he said. We learned 
later that the goods came from Massachusetts and outclassed 
everything of the sort that the Germans could produce in color, 
wearing quality and price. 

Last year we sold the Haitians 150 typewriters and 2,000 
sewing machines. And wonder of wonders, we sold them 
2,500,000 fishhooks ! Every native gets one American hook 
per year, so the European merchants will begin to say that we 
win the trade by "hook or crook," with an accent on the 
crook! But this is mere trade jealousy and we will keep on 
fishing. 

Haiti's exports last year were about $18,000,000, but 
Uncle Sam, after looking over the stock, decided there was 
very little he cared to buy. He did select some logwood to 







BUSY \)\\ AT A HAITIAN LAUNDRY. 



RHFUniJC OF HAITI 



113 




A SAND-BOX TREE, HAITL THE MOST BEAUTIFUL OI-^ ALL TROPICAL TREES. 



use as a dye, a few goat skins and 1,000 tortoise shells — the 
whole lot worth only $350,000. All the rest went to Europe, 
over two-thirds to France. German merchants formerly made 
fortunes in handling Haitian products. There was no magic 
in it. They bought on the bargain counter, and poor Haiti, 
spending every cent in sight, has only been able to import half 
the value of her exports. 

The coffee bean is the mainstay of the country. Over 
50,000,000 pounds were exported last year. The soil of the 
island is so rich that scarcely any effort is required to produce 
this "national meal-ticket." Trees planted 300 years ago by 
the French are still bearing, although Mother Nature begins 
to cry for assistance and crops arc diminishing. Brazil became 
for a time a fairy godmother to all the little coffee-producing 
countries of the world by maintaining prices with Government 
assistance, so the value of Haiti's output gradually increased 
in spite of diminished production, until we tried to run South 
America by mixing in Brazil's lousiness, and, not understanding 
the situation, lost friends. Since then, the coffee ])rice has 



114 REPUBLIC OF HAITI 

weakened. Women do the picking and are far more industrious 
than the men, but the really busy ones of the island are the 
bees. They manage to supply enough honey for local demand 
and 200,000 gallons for export ; just as a side line, they produce 
100,000 pounds of beeswax. 

In Port-au-Prince we passed a shoe factory and stepped in 
to look it over. We were surprised to find such a well-equipped 
plant. Only native workmen are employed, two hundred of 
them. One proprietor tans his own leather and is able to pro- 
duce a finished shoe at a lower price than French or American 
importations. Of course our shoe machines were used. 

The capital has five miles of steam tramway and is the 
terminus of railroads extending in three directions — westward 
along the coast to the rich vale of Leogane ; eastward across 
the fertile plain of the Cul-de-Sac to the great lakes on the 
Dominican frontier ; northward toward St. Marc. 

We rode out to Leogane with the x\merican construction 
superintendent. The road, he informed us. was built l)y the 
Plains Railway Company, Haitian, German and American 
interests, and cost $12,000 a mile. It has paid from the start. 
The vice-president lives in New York. The line taps ninety 
square miles of the richest .soil of the Republic, a plain sloping 
gradually to the sea, well watered by three mountain streams. 
We found sugar, cac"o and cotton under cultivation. Haiti 
exported 12.000.000 pounds of cotton and cotton seed last 
year. The fiber is not so long as that grown in the United 
States, but could be greatly improved by proper seed selection. 
Cheap land and cheap labor make this branch of industry 
remunerative on a large scale, but the area is limited. 

On the parent railroad of the country, we traveled from 
Port-au-Prince uj) to the border lakes, crossing the richest large 
area of the Republic, the locally famous plain of the Cul-de-Sac. 
In Haiti the term "i)lain" is used simply to distinguish between 
the general mountainous character of the island and the 
stretches of more or less level land. "Haiti" is an old Indian 
name meaning "High Land." They tell a story of how King 
George III. asked a British admiral how the island looked. 



REPUBLIC OF 1 1, \ IT J 



115 



"It looks just like this."" he answered, as he crumpled a piece 
of paper and threw it on the table. In fact, a good part of the 
country seems to stand on end. nt)t having room to spread. 

The C"ul-de-Sac Railroad is a very light-weight affair, but 
has been highly proiitable, as it taps the garden of the French 
Colonial regime. Then the whole plain bloomed throughout 
the year under irri- 
gation, and the recon- 
s t r u c t i o n of the 
French aqued nets, 
long ago fallen to 




decay, is the most important 
work, in many ways, under- 
taken by the Haitians. An 
American engineer, A. M. 
A r c h e r, received $200,000 
from the Government for the 
work. He rebuilt the dam, 
one hundred and eighty feet 



GLIMPSES OF TIIK RESTORED 

FRENCH IRRIGATION 

SYSTEM. 



ii6 



REPUBLIC OF HAITI 



in length and twenty-seven feet high, and cleared a main canal 
twenty feet wide, extending ten miles across the plain. A 
second canal is sixteen miles long. Water is fed into the 
lower channel by means of a 2,800-foot siphon. Much of the 
old French construction was utilized. This work restores 
cultivation to a tract parched in the dry season, and sugar and 
cotton i^lantations have come into their own again. 

Our train climbed one thousand feet in the twenty-eight 
miles between Port-au-Prince and Lake Saumatre, but seemed 
much higher above sea level, for the woods bordering the lake 
are rather of the temperate zone. The pine tree flourishes 
here, and two years ago revolutionists destroyed a profitable 
sawmill. The owners, the Peters Brothers, although born in 
the country, were British subjects, so it was the captain of a 
British warship who collected the indemnity, not very long ago, 
after threatening to blow up Port-au-Prince, if it was not 
forthcoming. 

The view from the heights above Saumatre is marvel- 
ously beautiful. In the distance we could see the twin lake, 
Enriquillo, extending into Dominican territory. At our feet, 
the Cul-de-Sac was spread out like a map. It was a first-class 
geography lesson. A good hotel would make these heights a 
popular summer resort for the upper-class Haitians, who now 
stick close to their villas on the hills above Port-au-Prince. 




SIGNALING IN THE PORT OF JACMEL, HAITI. 



REPUBLIC OF HAITI 



117 



W 



A. i 




A STREET IN AUX CAYES, SOUTHERN HAITI. 

The ]\IcDonald Railroad, now building, will traverse the 
country from Port-au-Prince to Cap Haitien, a distance of 
two hundred miles, with branch lines into the interior. The 
valley of the xA.rtibonite, the largest river of the island will be 
tapped. Stretches of the road are already constructed, the one 
up the coast from the capital now reaching LWrcahaie, an 
important banana plantation. 

We never saw^ elsewhere such a forest of bananas as at 
L'Arcahaie. The fruit is the staple article of diet of the peas- 
ants, and they give you raw bananas for breakfast, fried 
bananas for luncheon, banana-flour cakes for dinner, and fried 
plantains in between meals. These plants are staples of the 
tropics. It was from here banana plants were taken to Africa. 

No railroad as yet connects the capital with the towns of 
Aux Cayes and Jacmel, on the south coast, but the Dutch 
steamers on their voyage between New York and Amsterdam 
touch here, as did the French and. formerly, (lerman lines 
bound from Jamaica to Porto Rico. From the sea these towns 
are picturesriue, but on landing we found them very <lirt\- and 





REPUBLIC OF HAITI 119 

unsanitary. Hiey ex- 
port much coffee, cotton 
and (lye-wood, and the 
few foreigners engaged 
in business look a woe- 
begone, homesick lot. 
One cannot imagine a 
worse fate than to be 
stranded in Aux Cayes, 
which is also called Les 
Cayes and just Cayes. 

The traveler who sees 
only these coast towns 
of Haiti forms a poor 
'. - - and a partial impression 

CAKES AND GLASSWARE FOR SALE. ^^ ^'^^ COUntry aS a 

AUX CAVES. HAITI. ^v\■xo\^. Fortunately for 

our opinion of the Hai- 
tians, we visited interior \illagcs where the people are far more 
cleanly, where we obtained a very different idea of the independ- 
ent black man and his future than can be gained among the 
shifting cosmopolitan population of a port. Though Haiti as a 
subordinate unit among the nations of the earth is undesirably 
defective both in organization and people, the fact must not be 
overlooked that here is the first attempt of black men to conduct 
a civilized government. When it is considered that not so very 
long ago this line of human beings were jungle-men. afterward 
debased by vears of slavery, one must admit that they are 
doing very well. Here, at least, they have not the white man's 
competition to meet, an inexorable force that scientific men 
have asserted must ultimately wear out and destroy the black 
race wherever it has been injected into the main human stream. 
Hence, the Haitians are to be congratulated, and who knows 
but that this little Republic may, through example, prove to be 
the ultimate salvation of the colored race? \\q hope so. 



CHAPTER III. 

THE REAL HAITIANS. 

WE NEEDED no alarm clock the day we started on our 
saddle journey from Port-au-Prince to Cap Haitien. 
Every morning, bright and early, at the witching hour of four 
o'clock, the bugle wails forth from the Champ de Mars. The 
racket continues for a half-hour, so it is hardly possible to 
indulge in further sleep. 

This particular morning the bugle call was augmented by 
the cries of an angry populace and, rushing into our riding 
togs, we ran down to the street, expecting to find a dress 
rehearsal for a first-class revolution. The excitement was due, 
we learned, to the noncompliance of the Syrian merchants of 
the capital with a recent presidential decree. It seems they 
had been ordered to take out a well-nigh prohibitory license 
before conducting any further business. The time limit had 
expired, and the several hundred big-eyed Syrians were a badly 
scared lot that morning, as the Haitians had decided to eject 
them, bag and baggage, from the country. 

The French minister now came t6 the rescue, filing a pro- 
test against their banishment, and troops were called out to 
maintain order. Many of the frightened merchants sought 
refuge in the French legation ; others boarded a German 
steamer bound for New York. We learned afterward that our 
port doctors found a case of leprosy aboard, and had the ship 
fumigated and the party isolated. But just what to do with 
them became a problem. Haiti would not welcome their 
return, while Uncle Sam did not intend to include lepers in the 
list of Haitian imports. They were finally sent back to Haiti 
and placed under the protection of the French minister. 

• In our journey across the island, we followed the right of 
way and completed portions of the McDonald Railroad, being 

1 20 



REPUBLIC OF n.irn 



121 




BRINGING \EGETABLE ROrE TO MARKET. 




A RURAL FERkV IN HAITI. 



122 REPUBLIC OF HAITI 

built with New York capital. This concession has caused 
great uneasiness throughout Haiti, for, while the educated class 
realize that such a road means everything to the country, the 
masses see only the advent of the white man and are suspicious 
and distrustful. 

It is a matter of history that the granting of a cabinet-wood 
concession to Americans caused the overthrow of President 
Nord Alexis, and President Simon's downfall was due to his 
friendly attitude toward foreigners. The original McDonald 
plan was most complete. It provided for the building of 
350 miles of railroad, connecting the four principal seaports, 
at an expenditure of $13,000,000. It was considered rather 
a juicy concession, but Wall Street expects that sort of thing 
in planting money in a turbulent land. The bonds were issued 
for $32,000 a mile, drawing a guaranteed interest of six per 
cent from the Government. A fifty years' lease of all unoc- 
cupied lands for ten miles on either side of the road ; a banana 
concession ; and the right to operate a steamer line between 
Cap Haitien and foreign countries without port dues were 
included in the framing of the concession. After much lobby- 
ing, the bill went through, and a year before our visit the con- 
struction gang arrived with full equipment and began the laying 
of 8,000 tons of fifty-six-pound rails. Of the 1,500 employes 
we found that 200 were Americans. In September, 191 3, the 
line Port-au-Prince to St. Marc was opened to traffic. 

From the banana plantation of L'Arcahaie, seventeen miles 
up the coast from Port-au-Prince, where we left the railroad, 
our trail led to St. Marc, the coffee port, a day's saddle journey. 
We say the cofTee port, in speaking of St. Marc, for this brand 
of cofifee has become so famous in Europe that it seemed to be 
shipped from every Haitian port. We found this a bit bewilder- 
ing until initiated into the devious ways of cofTee export. 

There is no more attractive ride in the tropics than the one 
between L'Arcahaie and St. Marc. The road borders a spark- 
ling, iridescent sea, shaded by overbranching trees. On the 
other side are coffee and cotton estates, terracing up the hill- 
sides. In St. Marc there is neither hotel nor club. You can 



REPUBLIC or ii.irri 123 

sleep at the l)arracks, or pitch camp in the scjuare. If you 
come with letters, i)erhaps some foreign hu}er of colTee will 
take you in. 

The second dax's ride carried us on to ("lonai'ves, a logwood 
port, with an excellent harhor, and a very dry and healthful 
climate. Haiti has every variety of clime and scenery, from 
steaming tropic valleys to semi-arid plains. Gonai'ves is over- 
whelmingly proud of heing the birthplace of Haitian independ- 
ence, but it is a squalid little town. It boasts a club, however, 
where the traveler is hospitably received. Here we lounged on 
a shady veranda overlooking the waterfront and watched men 
loading logwood, hides and honey — a unique combination— 
on board a Xew York steamer. 

We chatted with a superintendent of construction on the 
McDonald Railroad and found him greatly impressed with the 
possibilities of the country. 

"Fertile? Well, rather!" he said. "And I have no com- 
plaint to make against the Haitian workmen. They think thirty 
cents a day good wages. But, you see, they don't have to 
work all the time to keep alive. They can go out most any- 
where and pick a mango or a plantain, and rum, coiTee and 
cigarettes are absurdly cheap. This all makes for indolence, 
and a slipshod mode of living. Drink? Yes, they get away 
with a lot of taffia, the native rum, but they are more tem- 
perate than darkies I've employed elsewhere." 

"\\'hat do you know about the A'oodoo?" we asked the rail- 
road man who had lived there long enough really to know the 
people. This horril)le form of sorcery w'ith its cannibalistic 
rites, brought over by the slaves from Africa, has long been a 
headliner in the newspapers. 

"Oh, you hear about it all the time," he answered, "but 
usually from people wdio have never been out of the capital. 
I've traveled everywhere myself and have never seen it. I've 
watched a good many of the so-called \'oodoo dances, too, but 
they seen to be just ordinary 'boozefests,' in the good old 
English of the States. The French- jabbering blacks just love 
to dance, and they do prance about outlandishly to the thump- 



124 



REPUBLIC OF HAITI 



ing of a crude sort of drum. They keep it up all night. But 
I don't take much stock in this yarn of their eating little chil- 
dren. Perhaps, 'way back in the mountains, they may have 
an old-fashioned 'snowflake party' now and then, the sort 
their grandfathers loved, but I don't think they ever get beyond 
the sacrifice of roosters and an occasional goat." 

And this is about all we could learn of \ oodooism from 
any one who really knew the country. 

The trail from Gonaives to Cap Haitian on the north coast 
leaves the shore and strikes into the interior, across the moun- 
tains. Up, up, we toiled, from the cactus to the palm, from 
the palm to the pine, until we reached the wonderful valley of 
Plaisance, not only the gem of Haiti, but all tropical America. 
This is the botanist's Paradise. From pine-clad heights we 
dropped down into Nature's prize conservatory, massed with 
ferns, orchids, and every variety of climbing vine. The little 
rain-swept village of Plaisance is a revelation to the traveler, 
something distinctly different from the unkempt towns of the 




SOLDIERS AND CHURCH IN PLAISANCE, NORTHERN HAITI. 



REPUBLIC OP ff.irn 125 

coast. Here happy-faced, neatly-clad people were in every 
cabin doorway. There was none of that "back-yard look" we 
associate with colored folks of the poorer class. These were 
the r(\il Haitians, we decided, the dignitied, self-res])ectin,L;- 
ctiuntr}- folk, untainted by a poor ([ualitv of white blood. In 
these natives of interior valley and highland plain lies, perhaps, 
the real hope for the Black Republic. 

The way on to Cap Haitien follows the fine old FVench 
highway, amid such magnificent scenery as one associates with 
greater mountain ranges. In Plaisance we slept in the home of 
a kind French priest and next evening reached the Club Union 
in Cap Haitien, a very comfortable club where foreigners live, 
Germans for the most part. 

Cap Haitien was the "Cap Francois" of the French, truly 
"The Little Paris of the New World," and today, in spite of 
years of devastation and degeneration, it is the most French of 
all Haitian towns in architecture. As we stood among the ruins 
of the crumbling palace back of the town, we conjured up bril- 
liant scenes of other days, when Pauline Bonaparte, sister of 
Napoleon, held court here, as the wife of the French (General 
Leclerc. Her dissipations and follies and Leclerc's death from 
yellow fever are part of the tragic tale of France's lost garden 
colony. 

Returning to Paris, Pauline cut her beautiful hair and 
buried it in her husband's casket. "What a touching tribute 
to wifely devotion !" some one remarked to Napoleon. "Oh, 
she knows that her hair is bound to fall out, since she, too, had 
the fever," said Napoleon, cynically. "She is quite sure that 
it will come in longer and thicker for being cropped.'' 

Some miles inland from "The Cape," as the foreigners call 
Cap Haitien, is the African Versailles, the ruined palace of 
Sans Souci, built by Christophe, the Black Napoleon. After 
the death of Dessalines, the first Haitian ruler, the country was 
divided between two of his generals. Christophe, ap[)ointing 
himself "King Henry," ruled in the north. 

Sans Souci, King Henry's royal palace, was furnished mar- 
velously, in the best European style. Two American ladies 



REPUBLIC OF HAITI 



127 




^5^Il"» I Mil- 1 m Ill r •gfJiiT'*';!"^'^ **■*• ' -^ , 



RUINS OF THE "STAIRWAY OF HONOR," PAI.ACE OF SANS SOUCI. 



from Philadeli)liia came down to instruct the regal black 
princesses. High up on a mountain, overlooking palace, plain 
and sea, Christophe built the great fortress of La Ferriere. 
today the most remarkable ruin in the Western Hemisphere. 
Here galleries filled with hundreds of cannon looked down on 
the path of French ships and the might of Fa Ferriere towered 
across the sea. It is said that 30,000 men lost their lives in 
the building of this grim giant citadel, for Christophe was as 
cruel as he was strong. Those who could not do his bidding 
were thrown valleyward to their death. 

He copied his court life from the monarchies of the Old 
World, creating a full line of nobles. There was a "Duke of 
Marmalade" and a "Count of Lemonade" (names of Haitian 
districts). One poor man was forced to bear the title, "Count 
d'Coco." No doul)t he was lucky to keep his "coco" on his 
neck ! 

Christophe did much to promote agriculture. He even 
brought plows from the States, and American experts to 



128 



REPUBLIC OF HAITI 



operate them. He tried to educate his people, introducing the 
Protestant rehgion. Today the American Protestant Episcopal 
Church spends $12,000 a year here and has fifteen colored 
clergymen. There are seventeen other Protestant missions in 
the country, 30,000 converts in all, out of 2,500,000 people. 

After years of firm rule, in which he accomplished wonders, 
Christophe's luck turned. Escaping from revolting slaves, he 
suicided at La Ferriere. 

We climbed up the fortress for the magnificent view and 
never have had a stift'er climb. It puts one in the Alpine class. 




FORTKE.s.s OF CHRISTOPIIE AND 
THE GALLERY OF CANNON, 
HAUL 

From the parapet we looked 
down on the little village of 
Milot, with its moss-grown 
ruin of Sans Souci ; on the 
white highroad to Cap Hai- 
tien ; on the seacoast from the 



RRPC'iujc oj' n.i/ri 



129 



Dominican border to the island of 'I'ortu^a. From Tortuga 
came the buccaneers who lirst settled Haiti. There seem to 
be a iLjood many bU)ts on the country's escutcheon. 

15nt taking it all m all — tragic past history, blood lines, 
racial prejudice — no doubt we fortunate, civilized Ameri- 
cans have been and still are a little unsympathetic in our atti- 
tude toward Haiti and the Haitians. After all, these pcoi)le of 




THE TREE UNDER WTTICTI KING CHRISTOPHE RENDERED JUSTICE. 



I30 



REPUBLIC OF HAITI 



the Black Republic are only children 
in the evolution of the races. Why 
not treat them with tolerance and 
kindness rather than with ridicule and 
contempt? Their lot is a hard one, 
and they will finally go down in the 
march of civilization. 

The Haitian situation is one of 
Uncle Sam's problems. As a republic, 
Haiti is a derelict. Not long ago, 
Captain Charles Young, a full-blooded 
American negro, one of two of his 
race who ever were graduated from 
an American military academy, spent 
three years in Haiti as a military 
attache. He went armed with a 
knowledge of French. His conclusion, 
after a thorough study of conditions, 
was that Haiti could never succeed 
in maintaining a stable government — 
that its only hope lay in intervention 
by the United States, with local con- 
trol left in the hands of the Haitian 
people. 

Often the eyes of the European 
countries are turned greedily upon 
Haiti, and this makes the responsibil- 
ity of the United States more weighty. 
Unsettled political conditions follow- 
ing the death of President Tancrede 
Auguste caused a German cruiser, 
which was coaling at St. Thomas, 
Danish West Indies, to be hurriedly 
dispatched to Port-au-Prince. This, 
of course, was a step to protect Ger- 
mans in Haiti from danger in a pos- 
sible revolution, but it illustrates the 
sort of problem which haunts Uncle 




REPUBLIC OF HAITI 131 

Sam. jMichael Oreste, the new President of the Republic, 
opened his rule with an energetic suppression of the disorders 
which, as usual, marked the change of administration. How- 
ever, he held the office less than a year, being succeeded 
February, 1914, by General Orestes Zamor, who has a real job 
ahead of him. 

Another issue at stake, besides the progress of the Haitians, 
is the maintenance of peace between Haiti and the Dominican 
Republic. Two peoples, alien in blood, traditions, customs, 
language, occupy the same little isle, and the border feud has 
waged through the centuries. Since the seventeenth century, 
when the Tortuga buccaneers who settled Haiti raided the cat- 
tle ranges of the Spaniards on the eastern side of the island, 
the hatred has grown and the border line has been in dispute. 

The Dominicans have the greater territory, the Haitians 
the larger population. It is natural, then, that the latter should 
have encroached on Dominican soil. The Haitian border- 
lands are immensely fertile, while the Dominican frontier is 
semi-arid. Nature seems to have marked the boundary. 

After traveling through both republics, one forms the opin- 
ion that intervention is ultimately inevitable, if there is to be 
peace. But the administration of local affairs should be the 
people's. The strong must help the weak. The intelligent must 
educate the ignorant. And so we are compelled to prophesy 
that the responsibilities and assorted worries of Uncle Sam, 
self-appointed guardian of the lesser American republics, are 
bound to increase with the years. As a nation, we hope and 
believe, we will be equal to the great task that seems to be ours, 
and work out some fixed colonial policy. The past turbulent 
history of Haiti will surely be repeated in the Philippine 
Islands, should they be "turned loose" to struggle with the 
problem of attempting self-government. 



THE PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND 
REPUBLIC OF PANAMA 

Canal Zone, contains 286,^20 acres — United States paid Repub- 
lic of Panama $10,000,000 for the land, paid France $40,- 
000,000 for Canal ivork and Panama Raikvay— Panama 
Railway, 48 miles long— Canal 50 miles long ; cost to United 
States over $400,000,000, cost to France $^40,000,000; total 
filial cost, inclnding interest, over $1,000,000,000 — People 
employed in Canal during construction 40,000 — Governor, 
Colonel George IV. Goethals. Republic of Panama, area 
j2,ooo square miles — Present population, estimated, 400,000 
— Free public schools ^64 — Chief resources, bananas, coffee, 
cacao, coconuts, cattle, rubber, vanilla, sugar, valuable 
zvoods, tobacco, pearls, minerals, excepting coal — Exports, 
1913, $4,234,010; imports, $23, §4/, 000 — Capital, Panama 
City, population, estimated, jo,ooo — Governor, until ipi6, 
Belisario Porras. 

CHAPTER I. 

THE CANAL AND REPUBLIC. 

IT WAS my good fortune to go through the Panama 
Canal Zone on foot at the beginning of my travels 
in South America, over three years ago, and to study in 
this intimate way the work on what has been justly called the 
greatest engineering feat mankind ever attempted. When 
I was there in 191 1 the Big Ditch was only partly com- 
pleted, a vast army of men was busy with excavators, explo- 
sives and dredges, our engineers were in the midst of a strug- 
gle with Nature that called into play every resource of mod- 
ern science and skill. Returning to the Isthmus recently, I 
saw the barriers torn away and the Canal an accomplished 
fact, a wonderful new highway "free and open to the ves- 
sels of commerce and war of all nations on terms of entire 
equality," in accordance to the provisions of our treaties. 
Though cargo ships are being floated from ocean to ocean, 

132 



PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC i33 

there is much work to be done and many details to be com- 
j)leted before the plans of the Canal builders arc fully realized. 
Nature has not yet been permanently subdued by the engineers. 
The great expenditure of treasure is by no means ended. But 
in giving the world this object lesson in American enterprise, 
ingenuity and perseverance, we have let no monetary con- 
siderations stand in our way. 1 can only repeat what I said 




PROFILE MAT OF THE PANAMA CANAL, 



T34 PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 

two years ago in Illustrated South America. "We are short- 
ening distance and thereby saving time, and, consequently, 
lengthening human Hves. We must take our reward and 
satisfaction in that. . . . The final, ultimate effect on 
humanity of the expenditure of money by Governments must, 
of course, be considered, rather than whether or not the 
expenditure will make returns in cash, for the civilizing and 
broadening of the minds of men is, in the final analysis, the 
true profit." 

The Panama Canal Zone is the most important of our 
outlying possessions. In many respects it is the most vitally 
valuable bit of land owned by the United States, internal or 
external. Because this peculiarly important possession of 
ours cuts directly through the heart of the Republic of 
Panama, from which country we obtained it, and because 
the United States has guaranteed the independence of this 
Republic in which the Canal Zone lies, it is only proper to 
take a glance at the land in which we have planted this great 
enterprise. The Republic of Panama is distinctly a United 
States dependency, and when one promises to "shoulder the 




MR. BOYLE ON THE BAYANO RIVER, INTERIOR PANAMA. 



PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC i35 




NATIVE VILLAGE ON THE BAYANO RIVER, INTERIOR OF 
PANAMA REPUBLIC. 

fights" of a country, however small, that country becomes 
interesting. 

The Republic of Panama is not of very great area, though 
it embraces within its limits practically the whole of the 
American Isthmus. The area of the country is approximately 
32,000 square miles. This is an estimate only, as no actual, 
careful survey has ever been made. Its total land frontier — 
that is, between Costa Rica on the north and Colombia on 
the south — is about 350 miles, w^hile its combined coast line 
upon the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans aggregates 1,245 miles. 
Its greatest length is about 430 miles, wnth a varying width of 
2,7 to 1 10 miles. Both coasts are studded with islands and 
indented with bays. The islands have been estimated to num- 
ber something over 1,700, small and great. A backbone of 
mountains runs throughout the length of the country, rising 
into peaks at some points and falling to comparatively low 
elevations at others, as in the pass of Culebra, which we 
pierced in digging the Canal. 

The country is bisected with hills and valleys, running up 
into the mountains, with alluvial stretches of level land along 
the seacoast upon either side. From this crooked, rambling 
10 



136 PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 

land 300 streams flow into the Pacific Ocean and 150 into the 
Atlantic Ocean waters. The slopes of the mountains and 
much of the low lands are covered with jungle and forest. 
This, briefly, is the topography of the Republic, the "baby 
brother" we have pledged ourselves to protect. 

It has improved since we began associating with it. The 
Panama of today "shows off well" in contrast with the Panama 
of yesterday. While little more than a decade has passed, 
since it became self-governing, its improvement and progress 
are very marked. All investigators agree on this point. 
Panama people may not exactly like to have it openly stated, 
but the fact remains that the rapid and great improvement 
in their national life could hardly have taken place without the 
helpful influence of their big Northern neighbor. Before we 
indirectly helped them to independence and separation from 
Colombia the history of the Isthmus was one of bickerings 
and revolutions. Since the bloodless revolution of November 
3, 1903, which set them free, they have had peace, and have 
reaped the harvest of peace, which is progress. 

One important thing we did, we made it possible for them 
to disband their standing army. This they did in 1904. This 
was a distinct blessing, since it is a fact that the army in 
almost every Latin-American country is a bone of conten- 
tion between the rival political parties. Whichever party 
wins over the army is practically assured of gaining the Presi- 
dency and oftices, and incidentally the treasury. Within a year 
after Panama gained its independence the Commander-in- 
Chief of the army laid a plot to overthrow the President of 
the Republic. The United States Government told him plainly 
that if he made a single move we would take charge. He 
"wilted" and quit. The standing army was no longer of any 
use in gathering political spoils, so it was disbanded. In 
point of fact, the Republic of Panama needs no army, since its 
peace and defense are guaranteed by the United States. 

The human element of this tropical dependency of ours 
consisted of 386,745 persons, according to the last census taken, 
.which was in 191 1. This included 36,000 Indians, and 50,000 



PAX AM A CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 137 

pcople under the jurisdiction of the Canal Zone. The latter 
number, which has greatly diminished since the practical com- 
pletion of the Canal, should, of course, be deducted from the 
enumeration. Still, counting its natural increase since the last 
census, the Republic probably contains close to 400,000 people. 
The native inhabitants are mingled Spanish, Indian and Negro, 
speaking a Spanish dialect. There are some immigrants from 
Europe and the Cnited States, and some 3.500 Chinese. 

The country is divided into seven provinces, administered 
by Ciovernors appointed by the President of the Republic. 
The principal towns are Panama City, upon the Pacific side, 
with an estimated present population of 50,000; Colon, on 
the Atlantic, with 25,000 or more; David, in the northern 
part, with something over 10,000; Los Santos with 8,000; 
Santiago, with some 7,000. and Bocas del Toro. built up ])y the 
l)anana interests of the United Fruit Company, with 6,000. 
Some of these cities have grown with great rapidity since 
the advent of the Canal builders in 1904. The city of Panama 
then had about 20,000 inhabitants, an old-fashioned, unsani- 
tary Spanish town. Now it enjoys most of the conveniences of 
other modern cities, including taxicabs and an electric street 
railway. Colon also is rapidly being modernized. Their near- 
ness to the eastern and western terminals of the great Canal 
of course stimulates them ; to be near a big. vital thing like the 
Canal naturally "starts things." 

Plowever, outside the big centers, the wheels do not turn 
very rapidly. The great lack is adequate trans^Kirtation 
facilities from the interior to the ports. One sees far too 




DISTANT VIEW OF THE CITY OF PAN.\MA. 



138 PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 



-e^ 



:r~^. 



.. / ^ /JPIUMi* 



IT^' 







I 



CORNER OF A PUBLIC SQUARE IN PANAMA CITY. 

much produce going to market on pack-ponies and two- 
wheeled ox-carts over very poor roads. When Panama became 
a repubhc there was scarcely a road in it worthy of the 
name. Recently they have begun to "get busy" in road-build- 
ing, the Government assisting with large sums of money. 
They have improved the cities, and are beginning to realize 
that to sustain the cities they must help the country, where 
agriculture has been in a primitive, backward condition. 

Since the North Americans arrived in 1904, the Panama 
people have constructed municipal buildings, including school- 




RAILWAY STATION, PANAMA CITY, 



PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 



39 




liouses, in all of the important 
towns; a $1,000,000 national 
palace and theater in Panama 
City, a national inslilute for boys 
costing $800,000, and numerous 
other line improvements, l);it 
they are painfully "shy" on rail- 
roads. Outside the Canal Zone 
I'ne, they have only about 150 
miles of track, consisting mainly 
of the Ignited Fruit Company's 
road and branches in the prov- 
ince of Bocas del Tore, prin- 
cipally a banana-carrying road. Ihiwever. the present admin- 
istration of the Republic is planning the building of several 
electric lines, which, wdien they materialize, v/ill aid the much 
needed development of the country. 

They have a lot of resources in the Republic; bananas 
galore, coffee and cacao, sugar, tobacco, mahogany and other 
valuable woods, and almost every common mineral except 
coal. It is an old volcanic region with a rich soil, and all it 
needs is the application of muscle and brains. It is begin- 



CTTV HALL, PAN.XMA CIl V. 




A GLIMPSE OF COLON HARBOR. 



i4:> P. IN. IMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 




ningto look as if these requisites 
were going to be brought to 
bear. 

They have some wise laws 
and a pretty sound constitution. 
The President of the Republic 
is elected for a term of four 
years and cannot succeed him- 
self, which tends to curtail politi- 
cal plotting. He is elected by 
popular vote, and is assisted by 
three Mce-Presidents and a 
Cabinet of five members. The 
law-making body consists of a 
single National Assembly con- 
taining twenty-eight members 
elected by the people. The 
present incumbent of the presi- 
dential chair is Dr. Belisario 
Porras, an able and progressive 
man. 

Financially the little Republic 
is in good condition, its total 
governmental revenues for 1913 amounting to $5,300,000, 
with a budget of expense estimated at $3,840,000. It has no 
national debt and is not likely to contract one. Evidently we 
are to be free of monetary trouble concerning it, at least for 
some time to come. Agriculturally the soil of the Republic 
has hardly been scratched; its immense resources in fruits 
have only been developed in respect to the banana, the United 
Fruit Company having shipped from the Bocas del Toro dis- 
trict alone last year over 6,000,000 bunches of that fruit ; it 
has capacity for the raising of beef cattle by the million, 
though it has at present probably not more than 100,000 within 
its limits. Plainly the Republic has a future if it can once 
get .started, and there are signs that it is getting under way. 
This is a very brief outline of the country in which we 



UNITED STATES LEGATION BUILDING, 

PANAMA CITY. BL^ILT BY 

THE FRENCH. 



PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 141 

have planted our gi^s^antic enterprise, the Canal, the country 
we have contracted to protect and to insure a continuous 
peace. 

At present the task is almost nothing; what the future may 
hring forth no man can tell. ( )ur guardianship of the Repub- 
lic is a mild one, but necessity might compel us to shut out 
intruders, safeguard the health of the Republic, or supervise 
its elections, though it is not the wish or intention of the 
people of the United States to annex Panama. At present we 
have all the fish we can fry ; what may be the inclinations or 
desires of our children's children, however, we do not know. 
We hope it may not be conquest, only helpfulness and peace. 

Having hurriedly sketched the country containing the 
Canal, we will return to the "Great Furrow" itself. It is worth 
looking at and justifies "tall talk." 

The history of the Isthmus and the building of the Canal 
is a kind of wonder story, the story of a world-dream that 
continued through 400 years and finally came true. The 
early Spanish explorers had a vision of it. Balboa's 
first report to Spain, after he had climbed the forest-covered 
hills and discovered the Pacific, was accompanied by a recom- 
mendation that a canal l)e immediately dug across the Isthmus. 
Evidently Balboa, or rather Saavedra. his lieutenant, wdio 




A .STREET TN COLON. 



142 PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 

made the suggestion, did not wholly appreciate how difficult 
the job would be. What the Spaniards had in view was a 
sea-level canal, and when one considers, for instance, the 
exacavation of Culebra Cut with the tools of Balboa's day, 
one sees that the explorer's recommendation was slightly 
premature. It is an interesting fact, however, that in Bal- 
boa's time the hydraulic lock system had been invented. The 
great locks of the Panama Canal are the same in principle as a 
lock produced four centuries ago by Leonardo da Vinci, the 
great Italian artist-engineer, for lifting vessels over eleva- 
tions — a most important discovery, but the Spaniards seem 
not to have considered it. At any rate, they dismissed the 
canal project; some historians say because of the adverse 
influence of the Church. The wise Spanish bishops cjuoting 
Sacred Scripture, declared, "What God hath joined together 
let no man put asunder." Then again, long-haired profes- 
sors told the public that if a canal were digged across the 
Isthmus it would change the Gulf Stream and make an iceberg 
out of England ! Their acumen was about on a par with that 
of a certain Western woman who, when told of the trouble and 
unsanitary conditions at first encountered on the Isthmus, said, 
"Well, if it was so hot and unhealthy, why on earth did they 
go away ofif down there to dig the Canal, anyhow !" 

As was natural, almost immediately upon its discovery 
the Isthmus of Panama became an important trade route 
between the Atlantic and the Pacific. The principal modes of 
transit were mule trains, canoes and small boats part of the 
way, and often human backs. ( )ut of this traffic grew the 
first European settlement on the mainland of America, the 
old city of Panama, founded in 1519. For over 150 years 
Panama remained the chief city on the Pacific Coast. The 
Europeans found it difficult to believe that there wasn't some 
natural waterway across the Isthmus. In fact, some of the 
early maps published in Europe showed an imaginary "Strait 
of Panama." Finally they got it through their heads that 
the barrier between the two oceans was a real one. After 
that the idea of cutting a way through never wholly died 



PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 143 

Surveys were first made by the Spanish in 1381. They 
reported that the scheme was impossible. Then the idea sim- 
mered for over a century, when it took root in the mind of a 
famous Scotchman, WiUiam Paterson, the founder of the 
I')ank of F.n;»iand. I'aterson's project was to estabhsh a set- 
tlement on the Isthnuis, cut a canal, and throu.<;h its con- 
trol "hold the key to the commerce of the world." 1"he i,n-eat 
banker's idea is the one we should now develo]), b}- making 
the Canal a port free of import and ex|)ort custom duties, as 
1 will later point out. Paterson's attempt failed ; at that time 
the carrving out of so difficult and tremendous an engineer- 
ing" feat was impossible. 

Again the Spanish surveyed the Isthmus for a canal. That 
was in 1771. The movement ended in smoke, and once 
more the idea simmered. Then in 1855 Americans opened a 
railroad across the Isthnuis. The exploration and surveys 
for this railroad are said to ha\e cost the life of a man for 
every tie. 

I*"erdinand de Lesseps, builder of the great Suez Canal, 
formed a company in Paris in 1877 to dig a shipway thnnigh 
the Panama Isthmus. Actual work was started in the next 
year. A red letter day on the calendar of the De Lesseps 
companv was January 20, 1880, when, in the presence of a 
distinguished gathering, the engineers fired the first blast for 
tearing a way through Culebra Mountain. But after seven 
vears, when the impossibility of building a sea-level canal 
within the estimated twelve years became apjiarcnt, De 
Lesseps quit the project. It was announced that the work 
could not be completed for the estimated cost of $240,000,000, 
for the very good reason that $300,000,000 had already been 
spent. The company went mto bankruptcy. In 1894 a new 
French company started work again, but m five years' time 
little was accomplished, and finally operations ceased. 



CHAPTER II. 

BUILDING AND OPERATION. 

EVERY one is so familiar with the story of how we 
obtained the Canal Zone and "made the dirt fly" that it is 
not necessary to go into extended detail here. In 1904 the 
rights and property of the French companies were taken over 
at an agreed price of $40,000,000, that being the extravagantly 
appraised value of the initial excavation work, the Panama 
Railroad, maps and data, buildings and machinery. Terri- 
torial rights came to the United States from a treaty with the 
new Republic of Panama, which came into being through a 
revolt from Colombia. Colombia had refused to grant us 
the rights necessary to insure our position in constructing the 
Canal. The treaty with Panama included the payment of 
$10,000,000 and an annuity of $250,000. to begin nine years 
after the treaty was signed. At the conclusion of negotiations 
the rival Nicaraguan Canal project was discarded and the 
United States was ready to begin digging, assured of the use 
and absolute control of a canal zone ten miles wide across 
the Isthmus, having an area of 2(86.720 acres, and jurisdic- 
tion over waters three miles from either side of the zone. By 
a new treaty recently signed between the United States and 
Panama, we are given sovereign rights in the waters of Colon 
and Ancon. the harbor towns at the ends of the Canal. This 
settles the last question as to complete American control of 
the waterway. 

The decision that made Panama a high-level lock canal 
was not made by Congress until 1906. In the meantime yel- 
low fever and malaria had caused alarming mortality, the 
same terrors which baffled the French having appeared in the 
workers' camps, and the problem of safeguarding health 
loomed up as greater than the one of engineering. Vigorous 

144 



PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 145 




sanitary measures were under- 
taken. Colonel William C. ( iort^as 
began his remarkable work, and 
through his untiring efforts and 
those of his able assistants, the 
Canal Zone was made a safe ])lace 
in whieh to work. Without these 
brave, skillful men of the medical 
department, the building of the 
Canal would not have been accom- 
plished. The death rate in the 
Canal Zone is lower than in most 
American cities. 

In 1907 came the man who has 
really built the Canal. Colonel 
George W-". Goethals of the United 
States army headed a commission 
which took the place of the first 
one, on which men had been ap- 
pointed from civil life. Colonel 

Goethals and the new Commission have been united in action 
and unusually efficient. Colonel Goethals is now Governor 
of the Canal Zone. 

When the Government steamship An con made her trip 
through the Canal August 15, 1914, officially opening the new 
ocean highway to traffic, many notable people were there. 
The most modest man was one holding an umljrella over his 
head and keeping as much in the background as possible. 
That was Colonel Goethals. His country has learned to appre- 
ciate his worth, quiet though he has been about the work and 
the trials he has had. The task in itself has been of a mag- 
nitude that is difficult to realize, and in addition there have 
been the influences of tropical conditions, of Government con- 
trol and of uncertain labor markets to deal with. For the 
efficient Goethals and those under him there is all honor. The 
mistakes that have been charged have been dwarfed by the 
successes of the herculean undertaking, and in the history of 



COLONEL WILLJA.M C. GOKGAS, THE 

MAN WHO MADE THE CANAL 

ZONE SANITARY. 



146 PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 

the Canal's construction, we are glad to state, there is not the 
smallest blot of proved corruption or graft, excepting in the 
company stores run by the Panama Railroad, which is owned 
by the United States Government. 

At times as many as 45,cxdo men have been employed on 
the Canal. The average number has been 40,000. It should 
be kept in mind, too, that the work had to be carried on at a 
distance of two thousand miles from the base of supplies. 

When the Canal was officially opened, a little more than 







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COLONEL GEORGE W. GOETIIALS, CHIEF BUILDER OF THE CANAL, 



PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPU/UJC M/ 




THE FIRST BOAT, A GOVERNMENT LIGHTER, PASSING THROUGH 
MIRAFLORES LOCKS. 



ten years after American work began on the Istlimus, over 
$400,000,000 had been expended by our Government. Much 
remained to be done, including dredging, the extent of which 
nobody could forecast, deepening of the channel for the larg- 
est ships, completion of fortifications and buildings, beautifica- 
tion and numerous other "final touches." It was originally 
estimated that it would cost $157,000,000 to build the Canal. 
After spending a good deal of time on the Isthmus three 
years ago. investigating and drawing conclusions to the best 
of my judgment, I made this estimate: ''When the ])roject 
is entirely finished, over $1,000,000,000 will have been invested 
by the United States and France." I have no reason to change 
my opinion now, when the total already is $740,000,000, add- 
ing the $400,000,000 we have spent to the $340,000,000 spent 
by the French, and adding interest on the money spent up to 



148 PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 

date, it will be seen that the total rises already close to 
$1,000,000,000. 

The original estimate on the cost of digging missed the 
mark so widely because the American engineers were unac- 
quainted with the materials of which the whole country of the 
Canal Zone is made — lava ash. Before the major portion of 




THE CHEAT CUCARACIIA SLIDE. 



the excavating was done it was necessary to remove many 
million cubic yards of slide material upon which the engineers 
had never figured. They learned that in order to reduce the 
pressure so the water would hold the soil back they must 
materially increase the excavation, and even with the grade 
greatly reduced the slides came with disconcerting frequency. 
When the Big Ditch was opened to traffic, Colonel Goethals 



PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 149 

pointed out that the earth had not reached a state of equil- 
ibrium, and that probably it would be necessary to continue 
dredging for many months. It was hoped that these earth 
movements would not be so extensive as to interfere with 
navigation, though the channel at several points in Culebra 
Cut necessarily would be reduced considerably in width for 
a while. Just two months after the opening of the water- 
way, rains caused a serious landslide north of Gold Hill, where 
the earth reaches its greatest height on the Isthmus. Thou- 
sands of cubic vards of rock and dirt entered the channel. 




5L0WING IP THE DIKE AT MIRAFLORES WITH 40,O0U roiWU.^ *)L 1)\ N A Al iTE, 
BEGINNING THE INFLOW OF WATER CONNECTING THE TWO OCEANS. 



completely blocking it for a distance of 1,000 feet. Ships 
passing through when the slide occurred were forced to wait 
until the great dredges could reo[)en the channel, an operation 
which consumed much valuable time. 

The total excavation in the Canal has been over 232,000,- 
000 cubic yards, with Culebra Cut, nine miles long, the most 



I50 PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 

difficult and uncertain jmrt of the work. Here over 30,000,000 
cubic yards of material, lying outside the intended banks of 
the Canal, was swept down into the cut. The excavation in 
the cut represents about one-half of the digging done by 
x'Vmericans. Slides frequently put the railroad system out of 
commission. Often they wrecked dirt trains and steam shovels. 
The work of removing the debris at Culebra took up many 
months. Colonel Goethals did the best he could, however. As 
an illustration, in 1909 the cost of removing a cubic yard of 
slide material was around 78 cents for the whole cut. \\'ith the 
slides more troublesome in 191 2 the cost was forced down 
to 55 cents. Fourteen per cent of the total excavation of 
19 1 3 was from slides. The Canal locks were ready ten months 
before Culebra was in shape. But for the slides, ships would 
have been going through that much earlier. And when the 
passage of ships became possible, dredges were still at work in 
the cut. 

The length of the Canal from deep water to deep water 
is fifty miles, and from the two shore lines, forty miles. It 
takes ten hours to make the trip. (It requires only sixteen 
hours for ships to pass through the Suez Canal, eighty-six 
miles long, but there are no locks.) \'essels passing from the 
Atlantic to the Pacific successively go through the approach 
channel ni Limon Bay, onward seven miles to the Gatun 
locks, where three locks lift them eighty-five feet to the level 
of (iatun Lake; thence through the lake to Bas Obispo and 
Culebra Cut ; thence through the cut for nine miles to Pedro 
Miguel, where they are lowered thirty feet by lock to a small 
lake; thence one and a half miles to Miraflores, where two 
locks in series drop them lo the Pacific level; passing out into 
the Pacific through a channel about eight and a half miles 
long. This channel has a bottom width of 500 feet. The chan- 
nel in Culebra Cut has a minimum bottom wddth of 300 feet. 

datun Lake was formerly the A'allcy through which the 
turbulent Chagres River flowed into the sea. The problem of 
controlling the flood waters of the river was most difficult, 
for the heavy tropical rains come down the mountain sides 



PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND RllPUBLIC 



151 



into the narrow valley with such force that the river has 
been known to rise more than tvv'cnty-five feet in twenty-four 
hours. To control the flood the great Cjatun Dam was built, 
holding back the waters and forming Gatun Lake, which has 
risen to cover about 164 square miles. The spillway of Gatun 
Dam, made of concrete on a rock foundation, permits the flow 
of 154,000 cubic feet per second. The normal flow through 
this spillway operates the hydro-electric plant w'hich supplies 
power and light for the operation of the Canal, there being 
enough power available for any probable demand for years 
to come. Xearly everything about the Canal is run by elec- 
tricity, and recently the engineers have been considering sub- 
stituting electric power for steam on the Panama Railroad. 
The entire length of the Canal is so well lighted that pas- 
sage at night is practically as safe as during the day. 




THE COMPLETED GATUN LOCKS, LOOKING NORTH TOWARD THE 
11 ATLANTIC ENTRANCE. 



152 PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 

In passing through Gatun Lake, vessels get valuable ser- 
vice for which no additional charge is made. One of the most 
expensive items of salt-water navigation is the accumulation 
of barnacles on ships' bottoms, which in time become so 
numerous as to impede the progress of even a powerful steam- 
ship. For this reason ships have to go into dry dock and 
get scraped at regular intervals. Fresh water, however, is 
fatal to the barnacles. The vessels going through Gatun Lake 
are thus relieved of their troublesome burdens of marine 
moUusks. 

The Gatun locks comprise the largest monolithic concrete 
structure ever built. Like the locks at the Pacific end, they 
are built in pairs, to reduce the danger of accident and increase 
efficiency. Five different lengths of chamber are provided by 
intermediate gates, so that there is no waste of water or time, 
such as would be the case were a 500-foot ship lifted in a 
1, 000- foot chamber. The weight of the largest Gatun lock 




STEAMSHIP "ANCON" PASSING THROUGH GATUN LOCKS. JUNE II, I914. 
THE FIR.ST LARGE SHIP TO PASS THROUGH. 



PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 153 




THE STEAMSHIP "SANTA CLARa" ENTERING MIRAFLORES LOCKS UNDER 
TOW OF ELECTRIC LOCOMOTIVES. JUNE I9, I914. 

gate is 1,483.700 pounds, and it cost a little over four cents 
a pound. There are forty-six lock gates in the Canal, all 
made of steel plates, riveted to structural steel frames. Their 
total weight is 118,488,100 pounds. \^essels are raised or 
lowered in the locks at the rate of three feet a minute. All 
gates and valves are operated by electricity. 

\^essels are not permitted to pass through the locks under 
their own power, but are towed by electric locomotives, four 
to a ship. These are among the most interesting features of 
the Canal, but one does not hear them called electric locomo- 
tives there. When I was a boy in Pennsylvania I used to 
like to follow the tow path of the canal until I met a canal 
boat, and got a chance to help drive the mules. It was nearly 
as much fun as riding the elephant on circus day. In my mind 



154 PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 

the mule is identified with canals. So I was not surprised 
that everybody else, including the makers of the electric loco- 
motives, as they watched these wonderful little engines at 
work, spoke of them familiarly as "the mules." 

The "mules" cost $13,217 each, and there are three dozen 
of them. They run on tracks laid on the lock walls and have 
gear wheels operating on racks between the rails, to keep 
them from being pulled off the tracks by the towing strain. 
Should a towing line break, the ship can be prevented from 
colliding with the lock gates by chain fenders which extend a 
hundred feet ahead of each gate. Emergency dams can be 
swung into place in the event of any accident to the gates. 

There are certain works which were in use in the final 
stages of the construction work of the Canal that can be 
cleared away. One of these is the pontoon bridge. The road- 
way of the Panama Railroad had to be shifted many times 
during the construction, but it was an important aid, and con- 
tinues to be. The sight of a train crossing the pontoon bridge 
at Paraiso was novel. 

At Colon, on the Atlantic, or rather at Cristobal, they 
were recently working on the big coaling station, building the 
reloading bridge. The station at Colon has a storage capacity 
of five hundred thousand tons of coal, and the station at Bal- 
boa, at the Pacific end, has a capacity of three hundred thou- 
sand tons. The Canal Commission wnll sell coal to any vessels 
wanting it, but there will always be a hundred thousand tons 
in reserve for the United States navy, ready for emergency. 

I noted also the work being done on the wireless stations 
at Colon and Balboa. Wireless telegraphy has so many uses 
that the Government found it necessary to assert its right to 
control this means of communication. With the responsibili- 
ties that it has at Panama it could not afford that its equip- 
ment should be incomplete. The Canal stations are now in 
communication with the great tower near Washington, D. C. 



CHAPTER III. 

TOLLS AND A FREE PORT. 

IT IS diftk-ult to estimate what the traftic through the Canal 
is going to be in the future. The European nations 
having gone to war just when the big waterway was opened 
for their cargoes has upset all calculations. That the tolls 
would pay operating expenses seemed doubtful. However, 
though the European war had largely curtailed shipping activi- 
ties. Colonel Goethals reported as this book was sent to press, 
that the Canal traffic was exceeding expectations, indicating 
that within a year the tolls might pay operating expenses, but, 
of course, no interest on the enormous investment. 

In accordance with the Canal Act of August 24, 1912, the 
following rates of tolls are to be paid by vessels passing 
through the Canal : 

1. On merchant vessels carrying passengers or cargo, 
$1.20 per net vessel ton — each 100 cubic feet — of actual earn- 
ing capacity. 

2. On vessels in ballast, without passengers or cargo. 40 
per cent less than the rate of tolls for vessels with passen- 
gers or cargo. 

3. Upon naval vessels, other than transports, colliers, hos- 
pital ships and supply ships, 50 cents per displacement ton. 

4. Cpon army and navy transports, colliers, hospital ships 
and supply ships, $1.20 per net ton, the vessels to be measured 
by the same rules as are employed in determining the net 
tonnage of merchant vessels. 

For a fair-sized freight vessel, it is estimated, the tolls 
amount to about $5,000. This is, of course, only a nominal 
charge, considering that ships save a 1 0,000-mile voyage around 
South America, but it is probably all the traftic will stand. 
Operating expenses of the Canal are estimated at about 

155 



156 PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 

$4,000,000 a year. The interest on the huge investment, how- 
ever, is $20,000,000 a year, indicating a continuous fixed charge 
of nearly $25,000,000 per year, which in time will bring the 
American cost of the Canal to my estimate of $1,000,000,000. 

The Canal rules require tolls to be paid in cash, except 
that in the case of steamship companies having boats fre- 
quently using the Canal they may be paid by check or draft, 
if prompt payment of same has been assured by depositing 
with the Canal authorities at least $15,000 worth of accepta- 
ble bonds. 

Upon my last visit I found that the Canal Zone had 
changed materially since I first saw it. Then it was filled with 
clusters of buildings, created by the Canal Commission, in 
which to house the workers and oflicers. And there were the 
native villages and the natives themselves. Some of these 
villages were along the route of the waterway, and as the 
construction progressed they were drowned out, or would 
have been, had not the Canal Commission moved them away. 
It is the idea of Colonel Goethals, the chief builder of the 
Canal and present Governor, that the Zone should be denuded 
of human habitations. That is naturally the military idea, but 
the Canal is for commerce. So on either side of the Canal I 
found only tropical jungles and wilderness. Many people 
have argued that the Zone lands ought to be settled upon and 
cultivated by Americans. This will be done some day. Colonel 
Goethals is firmly of the opinion that this priceless piece of 
work can better be defended by leaving the obstructing jungle 
on either hand. Knowing what that jungle is, I agree with 
him that it would beat barbed wire entanglements in keeping 
a foe at a distance, but this is a peace Canal. 

One of the new sights to me was the fortifications in the 
Bay of Panama. The fortifications are upon the islands of 
Perico, Naos, and Flamenco, which were ceded to the United 
States as part of the Canal Zone. The islands occupy a posi- 
tion in the Pacific commanding the western approach to the 
Canal. Some of the largest guns and mortars ever con- 
structed are already being placed in jiosition upon these 



PAX AM A CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 157 

islands. iVt Balboa, on the mainland, another set of fortifi- 
cations will be established, while on the Atlantic side there 
will be forts on Margarita Point, north of Colon, another on 
Toro Point, across the bay from Colon, and one on the main- 
land at Colon. In the neighborhood of the canal locks at 
Gatun, ]\Iiraflores, and Pedro Miguel, there will be con- 




VIEVV IN THE JUNGLE OF THE PANAMA REPUBLIC. 



15^"^ PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 

structed strong field defenses to provide against possible 
attacks by landing forces. In these fortifications strong sec- 
tions of the United States army are to be maintained. Of 
course, detailed description or photographs of these fortifica- 
tions are not permitted by the Government, which is right. 
However, we may rest assured that big things are being done, 
since about $4,000,000 has already been expended on the 
project. Congress having appropriated over $10,000,000 for 
these prime defensive works. 

But to revert to the Canal. I do not want to offend my 
South American friends by calling any of their countries a 
part of our own chain of United States colonies ; they are not ; 
but in watching the first freight vessels go through the Canal, 
and in talking of prospective cargoes, it occurred to me that 
these West Coast countries might, in point of results, be con- 
sidered our commercial colonies, or. if they prefer to put it the 
other way, they might call us their commercial colony. The 
Canal traffic, at any rate, is going to bring us closer together. 

I heard, while at the Canal, that the port of Guayaquil, 
Ecuador, at last is going to sanitate itself so as to get some of 
the benefits of the Big Ditch, and to insure the better mar- 
keting of its cacao, rubber, coffee, hides, ivory nuts, and 
Panama hats, in the United States. Peru is also considering 
making Callao a port capable of taking care of big vessels 
that could bring out her cargoes of copper, wool and sugar. 
Chile, since my visit to that country, has made a good deal of 
headway with the port of A'alparaiso and has also improved 
some of her other ports. Chilean nitrates were among the first 
cargoes tliat went through the Canal, and these are being 
followed by copper from the great Guggenheim mines, and 
by other products. This is only the beginning of a vast vol- 
ume of commerce flowing between South America and the 
United States. Especially must this come true since the 
European war opens the way for augmented trade between 
our nation and the republics to the south of us. 

In order to stimulate this trade, and make our huge Canal 
investment profitable to us, I am confidently putting forward 



PAXAMA CANAL ZOXJl AND REPUBLIC 



159 



a i)laii to make the Canal Zone a jrcc port, and, through the 
influence of this fact, to create a world-wide city at the 
Canal for the exchange free of duty of our commodities with 
the South American republics and other nations. 

I here quote from an address which I made a year ago 
before the Southern Commercial Congress at Mobile, Ala- 
bama, and which was published afterward by the United 
States Senate as Senate Document 555; 

''The definition of a free port is: 'A harbor where the 
ships of all nations may enter on paying a moderate toll and 
load and unload. The free ports constitute great depots 
where goods are stored without paying duty ; these goods 
may be reshipped free of duty. The intention of having free 
ports is to stimulate and facilitate exchange and trade.' 

"There is no reason why the Canal Zone cannot be made 
into a city of 500,000 people in twenty years and produce 
sui^cient income from dockage, tolls, taxes, rents, leases, etc.. 




UPPER GATES OF GATUN LOCKS, PARTLY OPEN. TAKEX BEFORE WATER 
WAS LET INTO LOCK.S. 



i6o PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 

to pay the interest on at least the original capital invested by 
the United States. We have 286,720 acres inside the Canal 
Zone. Already many millions of dollars have been spent to 
make the Zone sanitary and a desirable place to live in the 
year round. Nearly all of this will be a complete loss unless 
we build a great city there. The Panama Railroad, for which 
we paid millions and spent millions more to move and rebuild, 
will be a 'white elephant' on our hands, on the basis of invest- 
ment, unless we build a big city at that point. 

"Through the stimulus arising from making the Canal Zone 
a free port, a great commercial city can be built along the 
whole Canal from one end to the other with docks everywhere. 
This city would become a great commercial clearing house 
not only for the merchants and manufacturers of North, Cen- 
tral and South America, but for the whole world. Trade in 
every republic on the American Continent is necessarily more 
or less restricted by a protective tariff, therefore, we need one 
spot, at least, for free exchange. Tt it just as necessary as a 
clearing house for the great banks in our big cities. 

"Remember, the entire Canal is a land-locked, fresh-water 
harbor, berthing the largest vessels in the world, where bar- 
nacles can be scraped off the bottoms of ships — an advantage 
possessed by only one other great inland port city in the world. 
The building of a big metropolis on the Canal Zone is no 
experiment, no wild theory. It has been successfully worked 
out and proved by Germany and England and a number of 
smaller countries. 

"The only way to create a big city at the central point 
between North and South America, the Atlantic and Pacific 
Oceans, the Far East and the Far West, is to make the Canal 
Zone a free city and free port. By this I mean free from 
import or export duties into and out from the Canal Zone. 
This will not aft'ect the primary question of tolls for passing 
through the Canal. If created a free port and protected 
through international treaty, so it could not be affected by 
changes in our administration or home policies, merchants and 
manufacturers from all over the world would build factories 



PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC i6i 

and warehouses and establish branches and agencies at this 
World Center for c[uick distribution, delivery and sale. Many 
South Americans would establish agencies and branches there 
to reach the world's commerce. In fact, it would become an 
immense World's Department Store where everything for the 
use of the people of all nations could be found. It would 






PEDRO MIGUEL LOCKS AT NIGHT. SHOWING ELECTRICAL ILLUMINATION 

OF THE CANAL. 

become the greatest transshipping port in the world, especially 
as many boats suitable for the Pacific Ocean are not sea- 
worthy or insurable on the Atlantic Ocean. 

"As lawyers put it : AA'hat you have been saying is testi- 
mony — give us evidence of what a free port or city will do 
toward creating a metropolis of half a million in a few years.' 
Here is the evidence: Hamburg, Germany; Copenhagen, 
Denmark; Gibraltar; Hong Kong (formerly Chinese, now 
British ) ; Singapore ; Punta Arenas, Chile ; Aden, on the Red 
Sea, and the Island of St. Thomas, near Porto Rico. 



i62 PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 

"After Great Britain had taken Gibraltar from Spain, and 
that country would not deal with Gibraltar, the Sultan of 
Morocco forced the British Government, in 1705, to make a 
free port of Gibraltar by refusing to supply the food necessary 
to maintain the fortress, unless all import and export duty was 
taken off. The law of necessity caused the most powerful 
Government in the world, more than two hundred years ago, to 
establish the first free zone on a little rock pile three miles long 
by one-half mile wide, controlling the entrance to the Mediter- 
ranean Sea. Here is Lesson No. i, that should not be over- 
looked. Today there is a population of 27,000 at Gibraltar 
and over 4,000,000 ship tonnage is cleared yearly. As there 
is no duty, only a tax on tobacco and liquors, there are no 
statistics on the annual business. 

"Hamburg, Germany (before the 1914 war), was a notable 
example of the benefits of free exchange. Hamburg, through 
this wise policy, became the greatest port in Europe. In 1888, 
2,500 acres of the harbor of this inland city were set apart as 
a free harbor, where ships could unload and load without 
custom duties. A gigantic system of docks, basins and quays 
was constructed at an initial cost of $35,000,000, which at 
present-day cost would be double. A portion of the old town 
containing 24,000 people was cleared to make room for this 
great project. After that Hamburg grew enormously, reach- 
ing the third position as a port in the world, with over 1,000,.- 
000 population, being the second largest city in Germany. 
Without question the free zone of the harbor had a great 
influence on the expansion of Hamburg as a port. 

"Copenhagen is the most important commercial town of 
Denmark. The trading facilities were greatly augmented in 
1894 by making a portion of the harbor a free port. It has 
had a marked effect on the trade of Copenhagen and Denmark. 

"Hong Kong Island and City is a British possession 
acquired from China in 1841. Hong Kong is a free port and 
has no customhouse, and its commercial activities are chiefly 
distributive for a large portion of the Far East, much as the 
Panama Canal Zone would become if made a free port. The 



PANAMA CANAL ZONli AND REPUBLIC 163 

only commodity that pays a duty at Ilonj? Koiif]^ is opium. 
Owing to the fact that it is a free port, official iigurcs on its 
trade cannot be had, as in the case of ports that collect custom 
dutie^. but since it was made a free port the population has 
increased from a few thousand to 456.739. From this port 
there is an immense exchange of commodities between Great 
Britain and her colonics, the ports of China, Japan and the 
United States. This fact, investigation shows, is largely due 
to the advantages arising from the fact that the port of Hong 
Kong is free from custcMu duties to all nations. 

"Singapore is another good example. It is the capital of 
the British Straits Settlements, and lies about midway between 
Hong Kong and Calcutta, India, and close to the Malay 
Archipelago. It is less than 100 miles north of the equator, 
or 500 miles farther south than the Panama Canal Zone. It 
has good advantages of position, but above all, the policy of 
absolute free trade has made Singapore the center of a trans- 
shipping trade that is surpassed in the Orient only by Hong 
Kong and one or two of the great Chinese ports. The con- 
tinuously rapid growth of Singapore and the Straits Settle- 
ments, of which it is the capital, has fully demonstrated the 
wisdom of this policy. In 1819 when the region was ceded to 
Great Britain that portion of the country had almost no busi- 
ness or ]:)opulation. At present Singapore's free exports and 
imports exceed $500,000,000 annually, or about one-seventh 
of the total imports and exports of the whole United States. 
There are no custom duties except on opium. The population 
is about 275.000. Neither Hong Kong nor Singapore is as 
well situated for international trade or enjoys as good and 
healthful climate as the Panama Canal Zone. 

"Port Said is another case in point. The building of the 
Suez Canal created the city of F'ort Said on a sandpile at the 
entrance to the Canal from the Mediterranean Sea, with fresh 
water 125 miles away. It is about the "livest wire" of any 
city in the world — at least, that I have ever visited. It has 
over 100,000 population, and except for an Egyptian duty on 



i64 PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 

many articles would be a great trading center for others than 
tourists. 

"Aden, situated on a strip of British territory in Arabia, 
on the Red Sea, where nothing grows and fresh water must 
be brought a long distance, has 50,000 population on account 
of its being a free port and city. 

"Punta Arenas, Chile, on the Straits of Magellan, the farth- 
est south of any city in the world, is a free port and city, 
and has a population of 15.000. I was surprised at its impor- 
tance and its fine stone buildings and good streets. The only 
local support of Punta Arenas is wool and sheep, mostly from 
the old Patagonia country of Argentina and the island of 
Tierra del Fuego. Its importance arises chiefly from its being 
a free port, permitting a Chilean city to trade duty free with 
Argentina. 

"The free exchange of commodities, on account of there 
being no duty, import or export, put the island of St. Thomas, 
near Porto Rico, belonging to Denmark, on the map. It is a 
good example of what no export or import duty will do for a 
poor, out-of-the-way island. Nearly every excursion to the 
West Indies docks there to trade. Its one port carries the 
largest stock and does the greatest Panama hat trade in the 
world. Many vessels coal there. It has a great trade with all 
the West India Islands. 

"England has tried out the free port and free city idea 
thoroughly and this is what the Encyclopedia Britaiinica says: 
'In countries where custom duties are levied, if an extension 
of foreign trade is desired, special facilities must be granted 
for this purpose. In view of this a free zone sufficiently 
large for commercial purposes must be set aside. English 
colonial free ports, such as Hong Kong and Singapore, do 
not interfere with the regular home customs of India and 
China. These two free harbors have become great shipping 
ports and distributing centers. The policy which led to their 
establishment as free ports has greatly promoted British com- 
mercial interests." " 

I was fully convinced after visiting Singapore and Hong 



PANAMA CANAL ZONE AND REPUBLIC 165 

Kong during the past year, that we should make the si)lendid 
port of Manila a free port and eity, or we can never expect 
to secure, develop and hold our share of the trade of the 
Orient. Secretary of State Bryan stated to me that he strongly 
favored this policy in the development of our colonies, and the 
Panama Canal Zone is our most important colony. 

This question is a paramount one in the development of 
our commercial relationship with South America and other 
countries; besides, it will make the Panama Canal pay. If 
we do not act soon some other country owning one of the 
West India Islands, well located to trade with ships passing 
through the Canal, will take advantage of the situation. 
Already the Panama Republic intends to benefit from our 
investments in the Canal by creating a free city bordering on 
the Canal Zone. We should not stop short with the comple- 
tion of the Canal, but continue the great enterprise to a more 
notable, as well as profitable, conclusion, by extending our 
commerce and trade, not only with South America, but with 
the entire world. I sincerely hope it may never be necessary 
to use the big Canal to pass our navy quickly f roiu the Atlantic 
to the Pacific, and rice versa, in times of war. P>ut if the 
necessity arises, without question we will find it "mighty 
handy." 

The Panama Canal is the greatest industrial undertaking 
ever attempted and successfully carried to completion by any 
nation of the world, and we should all feel proud of our coun- 
try, and that we are citizens of the United States of North 
America. 



ILLUSTRATED 
SOUTH AMERICA 

By 
W. D. BOYCE 

The "copy" for tliib book was originally printed in the "riu'cago 
Saliirdaj lihule," ono of our four papers, as Travel Articles, by 
Mr. Boyce, on South America. Owing to requests from many peo- 
ple that it be printed in book form, it was issued by the oldest and 
best known publishers of historical books and maps in Chicago, 
Rand, McNally <fe Co., and in less than two years has reached its 
third edition. Price, $2.50. For sale by all book dealers, or Rand, 
McNally & Co., Chicago. 

PRESS COMMENTS. 

San Francisco Chronicle — The author has a natural bent 
toward the study of the origin of the various peoples of South 
America. 

Brooklyn Eagle — A good book it is, every page bearing the 
finger-prints of a keen and capable reporter. 

New York Mail — Best pictorial record of travel yet. 

Pittsburgh Post — It is a most valuable contribution to current 
literature. 

Atlanta Journal — In the 600-odd pages of this volume is a 
wealth of human as well as historical and practical interest. 

Cleveland Leader — He gave himself an "assignment" to "cover" 
that territory and he came back with the "story." 

Utica Daily Press— He wrote as he traveled while all the sights, 
facts and events were fresh in his mind. 

Editor and Publisher— In all this book of nearly 700 pages 
there is not a dreary page. 

Florida Times-Union— Written by an American business man 
who catches the salient point of view. 

Houston Chronicle— Full of valuable information and of com- 
merc al as well as literary interest. 

Kansas City Star — An exceedingly readable volume of some 
fiOO pages. 

Troy (N. Y.) Record — A good substitute for an actual trip 
through the little Republics of South America. 

News, Salt Lake City — Hardly a page of this volume is without 
illustration. 

San Francisco Call — Recommended for the exceptional full- 
ness and interest of its pictorial contents. 

Evening Star (Wash., D. C.) — A wonderfully interesting, his- 
torically accurate, splendidly pictured and narratively delightful 
book. 

South American (Caracas, Venezuela) — A truthful portrayal of 
first impressions. 

Herald — Buenos Aires (Argentina) — A timely, interesting and 
valuable treatise. 



UNITED STATES 
COLONIES 

AND 

DEPENDENCIES 

By W. D. BOYCE. 

Mr. Boyce, for his papers, personally visited all the Colonies 
of the United States, and wrote Travel Articles that were 
more popular, when printed in serial form, than his South 
American Stories. Possibly this was because they were about 
countries under our flag. He felt his work would not be 
complete unless he included the Dependencies of the United 
States. He returned to Cuba, after some years' absence, but 
did not have the time to visit the Dominican Republic or Haiti, 
but had the work done for him by competent employes. He 
does not seek to take more than the credit of carefully editing 
the copy and subject treated on these two Dependencies. The 
success attained in producing "Illustrated South America" led 
Rand. McNally & Co. to take the publication of the "United 
States Colonies and Dependencies." also. The first edition is 
ten thousand copies ; retail price $2.50. H it is as good a seller 
as "Illustrated South America" olher editions will be printed. 



Four Separate Books Containing the Same Matter as 

"United States Colonies and Dependencies" are 

Printed by the Same Publishers, at $1.25 Each. 

"Alaska and Panama," One Volume. 

''Hawaii and Porto Rico," One Volume. 
''The Philippines," One Volume, 

"United States Dependencies," One Volume. 



W. D. BOYCE CO 

(Established 1886) 

PUBLISHKR CHICAGO 



THE SATURDAY BLADE 

is twenty-seven }'ears old and never missed an issue. It is a 
big newspaper, full of the big things that happen. Special 
attention is paid to news that continues from week to week, and 
new inventions and discoveries. At all times it has an expedi- 
tion in some part of the world for new and curious descriptive 
articles and photograi)hs. The Saturday Blade is illustrated 
in colors. 

THE CHICAGO LEDGER 

is forty-two years old and has never missed an issue. It is a 
periodical with special articles and departments. The fiction 
stories are all written to order, usually topical, and with a moral 
that helps to shape public opinion in favor of Justice, Right and 
the Nobility of Labor. It is handsomely illustrated in colors. 

THE FARMING BUSINESS 

(Established in 1872) 
"Business" — is the occupation in which a person is engaged. 
Six million heads of families are engaged in the fanning busi- 
ness, and about 1,000,000 are readers of the only paper pub- 
lished that helps in every way the farmer to get more money 
out of his business while it entertains and instructs every 
member of his familv. The advertising columns of THE 
FARMING BUSINESS are clean and will be kept clean. 
The whole editorial policy is one of construction, not 
destruction. 

INDIANA DAILY TIMES, 

INDIANAPOLIS, IND., 

is owned by W. D. Boyce Co. It is a j)opular afternoon Inde- 
pendent Daily of over 60,000 copies daily and rapidly growing. 
Circulation doubled in past two years. The motto the Daily 
Times lives up to is: "A square deal and fair ])lav for everv- 
body." 

Total Annual Circulation of the Four Publications 

Ninety-one Million Fiv^e Hundred and 
Eighty-one Thousand 



36 91 



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